Gone Too Far (40 page)

Sam closed his eyes, flooded by a memory of tomato sauce, bright against the kitchen tile in Walt and Dot’s house. Jesus, imagine if that had been blood. It had been bad enough as it was.

“I really want to put my arms around you, Lys, but I’m afraid you’d take it the wrong way.”

“I think I’d like it,” she said, barely loud enough for him to hear, “whichever way you meant it.”

He reached for her, and she met him halfway, which was
such
a freaking mistake, because there they were, smack in the middle of his bed, holding on to each other.

But okay. He was a grown-up. Embracing a woman he craved more than oxygen while in the middle of a bed didn’t mean that he
had
to take off her clothes and bury himself inside her.

Even if
she
took off her clothes, he could leave his pants zipped. Well, except for the fact that he wasn’t wearing pants and his boxers didn’t have a zipper.

It was entirely possible that if he could keep this from turning sexual, he might succeed in impressing her. She might realize that he was serious. Then when he finally got up the courage again to tell her that he loved her, she’d realize he meant
I love you
instead of
I want you
.

But, oh, Jesus. Jesus . . .

“The police didn’t realize that Lanora was in the closet,” Alyssa said into his neck. “They’d searched the apartment, but they weren’t looking for a little kid. At first I thought whoever had hurt my mother had taken Lanora. But then I went into the bedroom and heard her crying. She was in the closet—Mommy had told her to stay there, not come out.”

Sam closed his eyes as he stroked Alyssa’s hair.

“By the time I found her, she was completely traumatized. I’m sure she heard whatever happened, but she blocked it. She used to have these nightmares and I’d wake her up and she’d say that Mommy was screaming. She never got over it,” Alyssa said. “All her life she was running from all that fear and pain. She tried to shut down the noise in her head with drugs and alcohol and stupid, empty sex.”

And Alyssa had tried to take control of her own emotions. Don’t get too close to someone who might leave you. And always, always expect the next piano to drop directly on your head.

“So now you know,” Alyssa whispered. She pulled back to look into his eyes.

Oh, man, that look on her face meant . . . Sam knew this woman well enough to know that she craved physical intimacy right now for a lot of different reasons.

The first being comfort. The second was that she was unbelievably hot, and she just plain flat-out loved having sex.

But the other reasons were more complicated. They had to do with her expectations when it came to him, and the way she’d defined their relationship in the past as one of pure sex.

He didn’t want her to look back on this moment and be able to discount their solid emotional connection. He couldn’t risk letting it be overshadowed by the physical, by the lightning bolts that were going to shoot around the room if he let himself so much as kiss her.

“I’m not going to kiss you,” Sam told her.

Alyssa didn’t believe him. He could see it in her eyes, and then he could taste it as his lips brushed hers.

“Ah, fuck,” he said, completely disgusted with himself, and kissed her again.

But while it was happening, while she was here in the denial phase, making love to him was, without doubt, the best idea she’d ever had in her entire life.

It had been too long since she’d been in his arms, in his bed, but every kiss, every touch was so familiar. She recognized the way she fit against him so perfectly, his taste, his scent, the heat in his eyes.

Sam was wearing only his boxer shorts and she let herself run her hands across his back—all that smooth skin, satin over rock-solid muscles.

His hair was short and darker brown than she remembered, all his golden, sun-bleached ends on some hairdresser’s floor back in Gainesville. She was used to it being much longer, down around his shoulders. She’d loved running her fingers through it.

But even cut short this way it was still nice to touch, so soft and thick, and without it in his face, his eyes weren’t hidden from her. She could watch him watching her as he kissed her, touched her.

She kicked her legs free from her jeans and yanked off her shirt and pushed off her panties.

Sam groaned, letting go of her and lying back on the bed, one arm up over his eyes. “Oh, Jesus, you’re naked.”

Alyssa laughed. “Is that really a problem for you?” She pulled off his boxers so that his erection sprang free. Oh, yes. Oh,
yes.
Praise the Lord for his magnificent creations. . . . “It sure doesn’t seem to be.”

But he stopped her before she could take him in her mouth, pulling her up with him so that they were both kneeling on the bed. “Just tell me that you honestly know what you’re doing. Promise me this isn’t just a reaction to stress, or high emotion, or Jesus, I don’t know what. . . .”

His eyes were so blue. He was looking at her so searchingly, as if he were trying to see inside of her head. Alyssa looked back at him. Was it possible that he was seriously going to stop them from . . .

She spread her legs apart, and he swallowed, his eyes following her movement. But he didn’t touch her, and when he looked back at her, he shook his head slightly, desperation in his eyes, even as he laughed. She could read
his
mind very clearly.
Don’t do that to me.
But she was determined to do that—and more. She reached to touch him, and he caught her hand.

“Please,” he said. “This is important to me.”

He
was
serious. And she couldn’t lie to him.

“I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing,” she admitted. “I just know that right now I want you so much.”

It was not the correct answer. She could see his disappointment.

“I’m sorry if that’s not enough,” she said. She brought his hand down, between her legs. “Are you sure it can’t be enough for tonight?”

There was no way he could miss the fact that she was completely ready for him. He didn’t pull his hand back, so she rocked against him, pushing his fingers slightly inside of her. Oh, yes.

“I’m not going to do this,” he said on an exhale, as if he’d been holding his breath. But just like before, when he told her he wasn’t going to kiss her, he began touching her, his fingers moving on their own, exploring. . . . He shifted closer.

And this time, when she reached for him, he didn’t stop her.

“Alyssa,” he breathed as her hand closed around him.

Oh,
yes
. . .

“I need you,” she told him, and kissed him.

His surrender couldn’t have been more obvious if he’d pulled out a pen and paper and signed it right in front of her.

He kissed her as feverishly as he touched her, all of her, skimming his hands down and across her body, then kissing and licking and, oh,
yes
. . .

He made a sound that made her laugh because it expressed so
exactly
all that she was feeling.

“Please tell me you have a condom,” she lifted her head to gasp.

“God,” he said, “I don’t.”

“I do,” she said. “In my fanny pack.” She carried them with her. Smart women did these days. “In my room.”

Not that she’d had the opportunity in the past few years to actually
use
one . . .

Sam picked her up, throwing her over his shoulder in a fireman’s hold. “Oh, my
God
,” Alyssa laughed. “Sam!”

He grabbed her jeans from the floor—that was where she’d stashed both her room key and her cell phone—and his room key from the top of the TV.

“Wait!” she shouted, but he just went on out the door.

They were both completely naked. No, Sam was
more
than naked. He was extra-specially naked, considering his body was standing at full, proud attention.

“Whoops, ‘scuse me, ma’am,” she heard him say, and she squeaked and closed her eyes. Oh,
no.

But as he opened the door to her room and went inside, she opened her eyes to look back and to apologize, but there was no one there. She smacked him, hard, on the butt. “Sam, you nearly gave me a heart attack—”

He was laughing as he tossed her down on her bed. “No one saw us. Besides, I used a special ninja technique to make myself invisible.”

“You maybe,” she said. “But not me.” She scrambled for her fanny pack sitting on the bedside table. It was jammed full of all kinds of stuff, so she took it and dumped its contents on the floor.

“You have to work very hard to be invisible,” he agreed. “You’re too beautiful. Although you did a great job of it back in the Wal-Mart, you know.”

She looked up from her search, feeling almost ridiculously glad at his compliment. “You think?”

“Yeah,” he said, coming over to help. “I didn’t know it was you, so you caught me. You won.”

“I like to win,” she said.

He smiled at her. “I noticed.”

And there they were. Two little red packages, attached to each other by a perforated connection that hadn’t yet been torn.

She tore them apart and turned to Sam, who had a funny look on his face.

Oh, no. No, no. She was
not
going to let him put the brakes on. Not now.

“Are those—” He stopped. Shook his head. “Never mind. I’m just paranoid, I guess, when it comes to condoms.” He held out his hand, and she gave the package to him. “You still sure you want to do this?” he asked as he covered himself.

“What do you think?” she said, purposely lying back on the bed in an extremely provocative pose.

Sam laughed as he looked at her, as he took his time looking at her. She’d always loved the way he looked at her.

And she loved looking at him, too. His body was sculpted by hard work and the SEALs’ constant training. He’d put on muscle since she’d last seen him without his clothes. Every time she saw him naked, he was more filled out, more of a full grown man. It seemed impossible that he could be more gorgeous, but somehow he managed to pull it off. And the haircut really worked with that body. Dear Lord, he was an amazing-looking man.

“I think,” he said slowly, as he sat down on the edge of the bed, far enough away so that he couldn’t touch her and she couldn’t touch him, “that if I try to negotiate with you right now, I won’t stand a chance. But I know that I’ve sold myself way short in the past when it comes to me and you, so I’m going to give it a try. Okay?”

He was serious. She was here on the bed, dying for him, and he wanted to
talk
? Alyssa laughed.

“At least nod your head yes,” he told her.

He wanted yes? She’d give him a yes.

Alyssa ran her hand from her breasts to her stomach, and then lower. She caught her lower lip in her teeth as she looked up at him. Heat sparked in his eyes, as he laughed, too.

But to her total surprise, he still kept his distance. “Well, okay
then
. I’ll take that as an affirmative.” He cleared his throat, but when he spoke again, his voice was still hoarse. “Here’s the deal, Lys. If you want me, you need to promise, right now, that you’ll have dinner with me when this mess is over. You don’t promise—I turn around, right now, and go back to my room.” He laughed again. “Yeah, we both know there’s only one place I’m going, but I said it like I really meant it, didn’t I?” He closed his eyes. “I hate myself. I’m so fucking weak.”

He wasn’t completely kidding.

Oh, Sam . . . “Come here,” she told him, holding out her arms for him.

He came, crawling across the bed to her, all blue eyes and tanned skin and hard, male muscles in motion, and she kissed him.

“I didn’t mean to make light of what you’re saying,” she told him, unable to keep from touching him now that he was close enough to touch. “I appreciate your being honest with me, I really do. I think that I probably need to be honest with you, too, because you don’t seem to realize what a major event this is—my being here with you like this.”

“Yeah, actually, I do,” he said.

She touched his face. He had such a beautiful face, with those beautiful, beautiful eyes. “No, you don’t. I know you think I’ve spent the past few years with Max, and I have to confess that I purposely let you think that, even to the point of giving you—” She cleared her throat. “—misinformation about it when you asked me directly. But the fact is, I went out with him only a handful of times. And I never slept with him. Not even once.”

“But I went to your hotel room and Max was there,” he said. “In San Diego. It was that night Jules was shot—”

“And Carla Ramirez died?” she asked.

“Yeah.”

“I think he sat in my room all night. I was a mess after—” Alyssa shook her head. “But we didn’t sleep together. Sam, I haven’t been with anyone since I was with you.”

There was wonder in his eyes now. “Holy shit, Alyssa . . .”

She caught herself. “To be
completely
honest, I probably would have hooked up with Max, but he didn’t want to. . . . No, that’s not completely true either. He wanted to, but he
wouldn’t
. Not while I was working for him.”

“He’s insane. He’s got to be completely—”

“He’s principled,” she corrected him. “He’s amazing. He really is a good man, Sam. I think if you didn’t spend so much energy hating him, you might actually like him.”

The wonder was replaced by worry. “Do you, um . . . Shit, I know I’ve asked you this before, but he makes me so jealous. . . . Do you love him?”

Alyssa looked at him. “Yes, Roger,” she said. “I love him. That’s why I took off your clothes. That’s why I’m dying to make love to
you
.”

He kissed her then, and kissed her and kissed her, pushing her back on the bed, his weight heavy between her legs. He kissed his way down her throat, licking her breasts, drawing her into his mouth.

“Oh, God!” She arched against him, searching for him, needing him inside of her, but he’d shifted back.

“Hey, Lys?” he said, and as she looked up at him, she saw that his eyes were luminous. “Could you maybe say that to me again?”

She knew what he meant, what he wanted to hear. Make love. Not sex.
Love
. The idea that hearing her say those words could mean so much to him took her breath away. She almost couldn’t say it. She had to whisper. “I’m dying to make love to you, Sam.”

He held her gaze as he shifted his position and . . . Oh, it felt so good.

“Sam,” she breathed, realizing that she hadn’t told him what she’d wanted to tell him, and needing him to know. “I know a really great restaurant, not far from my apartment in D.C. They don’t chase you out after you finish dinner. You can just sit there and talk all night if you want.”

If you really, honestly wanted to get to know someone. He understood what she was saying. She could see it in his eyes. He kissed her then, the sweetest, deepest, most perfect kiss of her entire life.

He remembered exactly how to touch her, how to move to make her crazy. Slowly. So slowly. Oh, the things he was doing to her . . . It was too good. Nothing could possibly be this good, but it was, because it was
Sam
, and it scared her to death that she was back here, right here again, like this, with him.

He was breathing her name. “Alyssa . . .”

It might’ve been a question. He seemed to want an answer. She gave him one, although it wasn’t quite a word.

“Tell me what you want,” he breathed in her ear.

“Please,” she managed.

“Tell me . . .”

“You,” she gasped. “I want
you
.”

And, oh, that got the right response, the response she’d hoped for. He knew damn well that she liked sex—making love—hard and fast, that she loved driving
him
crazy. This would do it.

Oh, yes. Oh
, yes . . .

“Lys . . .”

She heard the tension in his voice and she opened her eyes to look up at him, and she saw it in his face, in the corded muscles of his shoulders and arms. She watched his eyes as he fought his release, as she fought hers, too. This was too good to end, too good, too—

“Come on!” He half growled, half laughed his frustration, because he somehow knew what she was doing, knew she was holding back. Sam knew her, knew her . . . He
knew
her.