Her Perfect Stranger (5 page)

her cheeks and her shallow breathing gave her away. He expected great satisfaction to course through him, as he'd indeed shattered her aloofness, but since she was clearly furious at him for doing so, it was somehow a hollow victory. IN HOUSTON, things were different. Everyone on the team but Mike lived there, so they had their own home to go to every night. NASA had booked a hotel suite for Mike, so there were no more clandestine, late-night bathroom "meetings" in the barracks. Corrine missed them. A week into their training at Johnson Space Center, she knew she had a problem. It wasn't the team; they were working well together. More than well, mostly because now that she knew they thought of her as the Ice Queen, she used it to her advantage. She wasn't there to make friends, she told herself, but to lead a team. Once again, the problem was Mike. He was driving her crazy. Yes, he'd kept their secret; he hadn't told a soul about their wild night of passion. But he was no longer ignoring her. Well, that wasn't true. To anyone else, anyone who didn't know of their past, Mike and Corrine were working together. Period. They'd see nothing but a professional link as the two of them continued trying to make their mission a success. Their chemical attraction remained secret because somehow Mike managed to keep his expression perfectly even, his every thought hidden behind his cool, assessing eyes. And still he strove to drive her insane with hidden touches. Often. Al the time, as a matter of fact. Just a finger over her skin. A whisper of a wicked smile. A brush of his thigh to the back of hers. A million different things, each designed to drive her right out of her living mind with lust. She couldn't take it anymore. You didn't have to be a genius to know he was trying to make a point, but she was already hot and aroused every single second of every single day, so she couldn't figure out what that point was supposed to be. After one particularly long, hot, frustrating day, after spending hours and hours attempting to coax one of the robotic arms to do as it was told, Corrine snapped. She and Mike had been side by side for hours at a time. All that time she'd been breathing his scent, feeling his own frustration mount. He was currently on his stomach, stretched out on the platform, toying with the apparatus they were trying to operate, trying being the operative word. Jimmy and Frank were below him; Stephen was in the control room watching the computer images. All of them were deep in concentration. Only Mike drew her gaze. His dark hair was ruffled, from fingers plowing through it, no doubt. His sleeves had been shoved up long ago, revealing tough, sinewy forearms, tense with strain. Every muscle in his sleek back was delineated and outlined by his damp shirt. That back alone stole her breath, then she allowed her eyes to drop lower. It shocked her how easily he pulled her out of work mode. This had to stop or she was simply going to go up in smoke. At the end of the day, she calmly—or so she told herself—followed him out into the hall. "I can't do this," she said to his retreating back, making him stop. "I'm so on edge I can't stand myself, Mike. We have to..." She steeled herself to look cool and composed, but he whipped around and grabbed her hand, opened another door, to a storage closet, then pulled her into the dark space. "Mike—" His name was pretty much all she got out before he hauled her up against him and kissed her, hard. It took her exactly one instant to wrap herself around him like a second skin and kiss him back, just as hard. Something happened in that desperate moment. It became so much more than a kiss, and far more necessary than breathing. Closing her eyes to the dark around them, to the fact that this was really, really stupid, Corrine concentrated only on Mike, on his rough groan as he felt her with his hands, at the taste of him, at the contact of his big, hard body against hers. After a long heated moment, during which their hands fought with clothing to get as close as possible, she came up for air. "Mike." He pressed his forehead to hers, his breathing ragged. "I know." He thrust his hips to hers, his frustration evident in the size of his erection. "Mike..." "Please, Corrine, don't turn back into the commander. Not yet. You just sounded so...turned on. I had to touch you." Touch her he had. Her body was still thrumming with a burning desire, on the very edge, but she pulled back. He sighed and dropped his hands. "You go first," he said, sounding strapped for air. "I'll stagger out when I can walk. It should only take about an hour." She smoothed her clothing, imagining how she must look, al rosy and swolen-lipped. "We have to stop. You have to stop." "Stop what, exactly?" "Stop...touching me. You know, brushing up against me by accident." "We happen to work within very close confines." "Yeah, well, it doesn't have to be that close. And stop looking at me," she added, ignoring his startled laugh. "I mean it. You look at me and I can't think, Mike." "Stop touching you, stop looking at you. Is it okay if I still breathe?" Now she'd hurt his feelings again. "I'm sorry." "Just go, Corrine." With as much dignity as she could, she went, horrified by her yearning to dive back into the closet and attack him like a hormonal teenager. And horrified that anyone, anyone at all, could have innocently opened the storage closet and found them, locked in their ridiculous, uncontrollable passion. 8 PASSION WAS ONE GREAT BIG mystery to Corrine. She'd felt it to some degree over the years of her adult life, but only in a limited way. Such an irrational emotion required letting go of the reins of control. While she could loosen her grip on those reins, she'd never entirely let go. As a result, when it came to matters of the heart, she'd always been able to take it or leave it. This time, however, there was no taking it or leaving it. It had taken her, and it had the clamp of a bulldog's jaws. But she hadn't been born stubborn for nothing. She was tenacious, too, and if she wanted to walk away from what she felt for Mike, well then, she'd walk away. She was in control. This was her life. She had to repeat that to herself during the next week, often. They were deeply embroiled in the mission, working with prototypes of their real cargo. At the moment, they were trying to nail down the unloading process—a tricky, dangerous, huge undertaking complicated by the fact that no one had ever done it before. Daily run-throughs were critical. If they messed up in space, not only would they toss away bilions of dolars, they would further delay the completion of the International Space Station, perhaps indefinitely. Couldn't happen. As a result, total and complete dedication was essential. Corrine was certain she had her team's total concentration; her own was debatable. Horrifying, the way her mind wandered. Horrifying and humiliating, because more often than not, where it wandered was straight into the gutter. She wanted Mike, and she wanted him naked. "Commander's mumbling to herself again," Frank said from far above, on the platform that put him at eye level with the robotic arm they were still attempting to master. Jimmy, on his bely next to Mike, who was also spread out on the platform, brow furrowed as he worked, laughed. "She always mutters." "I do not." Corrine climbed the ladder to reachthem. Everything in this hanger was to scale, which meant huge. If she let herself think like a civilian, look around with an untrained eye, she felt like an ant. "Actually, you do," Stephen called up from ground level, where he was watching the computer monitor carefully. "You mutter a lot. It's how we gauge your mood." Mike, all stretched out, muscles bunching and unbundling as he worked, laughed, but bit back his smile when she looked at him with a raised brow. "I don't know anything," he said, going back to his work. Yeah, right. At least they didn't know what she'd been muttering about. There was some relief in that she'd managed to keep everything a secret. They'd managed. She had to give Mike credit for that, because for whatever reason, he'd abided by her wishes. She watched him now, watched as for the first time they managed to slide the robotic arm— with Mike on it— into the absolutely precise spot, the one that would allow the solar panels to be correctly unloaded. Perfect. It was a huge accomplishment, worthy of a celebration, and as a huge smile split her face, Corrine turned to her team. They turned to each other. Jimmy slapped Frank on the back. Stephen whooped and hollered, then high-fived the other men when they came down. Corrine watched, a pang in her heart, until Mike came down, too, and craned his neck. Across the twenty feet or so that separated them, he looked right at her. The ever-present heat was still there, simmering and igniting a slow burn in the pit of her belly, but there was more, too. There was the thrill of what they'd done, and the need to share it with each other. He took a step toward her, a slow smile curving his lips. Everything within her tightened in anticipation. Then Stephen reached out for Mike, halting his progress, and the connection was broken. Corrine stepped closer, wanting to join the testosterone-fest, be part of the backslapping and whooping. But while they all turned to her, still smiling, stil proud and filed with excitement, each one ofthem refrained from physical contact. It didn't help to know it was her own damn fault, that she'd kept them on the wrong side of her personal brick wall. It also didn't help to watch Mike, so excited, and so damn sexy with it. How was it that he could be so comfortable in his own skin, all the time? He fit into this world like a piece of the puzzle, and why shouldn't he? He had a penis. Great. She was in her thirties and had penis envy. Pathetic. She turned away, and had nearly made it to the door before she felt the touch on her elbow. She didn't need to look to know it was Mike, that he'd somehow broken free of the pack. Not when her entire body shivered at that light touch. What would he say, she wondered wildly, if she told him what she'd just discovered about herself, that she was jealous, patheticaly jealous of what he so effortlessly had with the team? That she no longer enjoyed her solitude? "Corrine," he said in a low, husky voice that scraped at every raw nerve and made her shudder again. "We did it." "I know." She didn't look at him, couldn't. He touched her again. Standing behind her as he was, with his back to the team, no one could see how he stroked the small of her back. Just a few fingers, nothing more, and it shook her to the core. "I'm going to go upstairs." To the control room. Where there would be more ecstatic people, but them she could handle. "I want to see if—" "We did it, Corrine. I think that deserves a hug, don't you? Or maybe even more. What do you think?" Nervous now, she let out a little laugh. "You're crazy. I can't touch you here." "Why not? The rest of us did." Had he read her mind, or was she just that transparent when it came to him? "Why would anyone think anything of it?" he asked reasonably. Yes, why would they? All sorts of excuses danced in her head, but at the root of all of them came the truth. "It's not them, it's me. I don't know what happens to me around you." "I do. I threaten your sense of control." His broad chest brushed her shoulder. "You threaten mine right back. Did you ever think of that?" She studied the door. "No." "This isn't going to go away," he said quietly. "We might as well just go with it." "You mean sleep together again." "Hell, yes," he said fervently. She laughed then, but since it sounded half-hysterical, she brought her hands up to her mouth. "Oh, God, Mike. I don't know what to do with you." He turned her to face him, looking deep into her eyes. "Yes you do. You know exactly what to do." When she only stared at him, probably wild-eyed and wide-eyed, he let out a long, slow breath. "You're torturing me. You know that?" "I'm torturing you?" "All these stolen touches and wild kisses—" "Then stop—" "I look at you with your hair up, in these severe clothes, and I want to see the other Corrine. Without the mask of the job, without the icy control. It makes me ache." "Mike—" "Ache," he whispered. "I'm staying at the Hyatt hotel. Suite—" "No," she quickly gasped, putting a finger to his mouth. "Don't tell me—" "Six forty-four," he said around her fingers. He grinned. "Sixth floor again. Can you believe the irony? I'm hoping it's a lucky sign." She groaned and closed her eyes. "I didn't want to know that." "Yes, you did." Yeah, damn it, she did. AS IF FATE WAS MOCKING her, the day ended early, leaving Corrine with two choices. She could go home and see what she could cook up for dinner. Or she could catch a movie, as she'd been wanting to do for months. She pulled up to her complex and stared at the building. She hadn't gone food shopping; she'd have to make due with cold cereal and the television for company. Mmm, so appealing. Well, it was her own fault, being so wrapped up in work that she no longer had a private life. She could go see her parents, who'd welcome her with open arms. But much as she loved them, that didn't appeal at the moment, either. Going to the Hyatt to see what Mike wanted, now that appealed. Only she knew what he wanted; yes, she knew exactly. It was the same thing she wanted. But what then? Would this almost desperate need for him go away? Telling herself it would, it had to, because she couldn't stand it otherwise, she ran into her condo to change, then ran right back out again and drove toward the hotel. THE KNOCK AT THE DOOR startled Mike. His heart began to race, and though he told himself it could be anyone, anyone at all, he hurried toward the door, holding his breath, wondering, hoping... And then he was looking into Corrine's eyes and seeing everything he felt mirrored right back at him: need and wariness, and even fear. "I don't know what's happening to my perfectly planned out life," she said, clearly baffled. "I can't concentrate, can't think, can't do anything except daydream about you, and—" she straightened and pointed at him "—it's all your fault." "That's funny." "There's nothing funny about this." "It's funny because I'm having the same problem," he said. "And I was pretty certain it was al your fault." She let out a little disbelieving laugh. "Yeah, right. You're having the same problem." "Can't eat, can't sleep, yadda, yadda," he said, narrowing his eyes when she laughed again. "Now you're amused." "Yes, because you're having no trouble at all concentrating and thinking! I know because I've been watching you. You look cool, calm and colected, and I've got to tell you, Mike, it's really ticking me off." Now he laughed. And hauled her close,
takingher mouth, her body and his own life into his hands, because he was going to have her again, he had to have her, and now. Given the hungry sound that ripped from her throat, she felt the same way. He deepened the kiss and she met him more than halfway. It was a bigger thrill than what they'd accomplished today at work. Sinking his fingers into her hair, he freed it from the clip that held it captive. She dug her fingers into his scalp, too, holding his head prisoner to the kiss he didn't want to escape from, anyway. They were gravitating toward something hot and out of control, their bodies sliding and grinding against each another, their hands fighting for purchase, when Corrine pulled back to draw a breath. He pulled back, too, and she bit his lower lip. Heat spiraled through him and he reached for the zipper on her sweater. But she put her hands over his. Barely able to see through the sexual haze she'd created, he shook his head. "We're stopping?" Her breathing was as uneven as his strained voice, her eyes glazed, her mouth full and wet. She looked very uncommanderlike, and he thoroughly enjoyed that. "We're right in the open doorway, Mike." Oh. Oh yeah. He'd forgotten. They could have been on the moon for all he remembered. "See? Proof positive you make me lose my mind." He pulled her in, stopping only to slam the door before leading her to the king-size bed. She came to a grinding halt, staring at it. "Are we making another mistake?" Hell yes, but he wasn't about to admit that now, so he pulled her around and kissed her again, kissed her long and thoroughly, until he could barely recall his name and knew she couldn't either. Then and only then did he go for the prize once again—the zipper on the form-fitting sweater she wore. His knuckles brushed her skin as he worked it down, down, down, discovering halfway that his sexy commander wore nothing beneath. Bending, he put his mouth to her throat. Her eyes slid shut as he nipped and sucked his way down to the base of her neck. "Mike...wait." He tasted her soft, creamy flesh. She moaned. "Now?" he asked hopefully, still tugging on the zipper. "I don't know." She pulled his T-shirt free of his waistband and over his head. Then stood blinking at his chest. "How come you're so perfectly made?" she asked seriously, lifting her hand to run her fingers over the muscles that twitched with her every touch. "God designed man this way so despite our stupidity, women couldn't resist us. Is it working?" She nodded slowly. "Undoubtedly." "I'm sorry I'm hurting you at work, Corrine. I don't mean to be." "I know." She stared at his body with what looked like befuddled arousal. "Now?" he asked in a voice very close to begging as he fingered the zipper between her breasts. "Okay," she whispered. "Now." Ziiip. He spread the sweater open, pushing the material from her shoulders to hang from her elbows. Looking down at her, he found even his ragged breathing went still. Everything went still, except his heart, which chose this moment to ache like hell. "You take my breath away, Corrine." She put a hand over the one he'd pressed to his heart. "Mike—" "No, I mean it. Look at you." Reverently, he reached out and touched the tip of one beaded nipple. She let out a sexy, helpless little sound that nearly did him in. "I want to drop to my knees and worship you for..." The rest of my life. "Kiss me, Mike." "But..." He wanted to think about this, discuss it. "Kiss." As if she'd read his thoughts and had been equally terrified, she hauled him close. "Just shut up and kiss me." Making sure he complied, she glued her mouth to his, making love to it with her tongue, sliding in and out in a motion he didn't even try to resist, and within moments they were clinging to each other. He couldn't touch enough of her, and when he tried harder, she lifted a leg to his hip, pressing the heat of her to him, gliding over him until his eyes crossed. "Okay, we've got to get horizontal," he decided breathlessly. "Before we kill each other." Tipping her to the bed, he crawled up her body, spreading her legs to make a place for himself between them. Corrine pushed her hips up, meeting his erection more than halfway. Somehow her skirt had gotten shoved up to her waist, leaving only the silky barrier of her panties between them, but the friction of that, along with the helpless but insistent thrust of her hips, nearly did him in. Nearly. Because while she took his breath, she'd also somehow taken his heart. He wanted to talk, wanted to know what was happening, wanted to know why he suddenly felt as though maybe it was far more than simple, unquenchable heat they were generating right here on this bed. Only she grabbed his ears and pulled his mouth back to hers, keeping it busy while she pumped and rocked her hips against the biggest hard-on he'd ever sported. "Now," she demanded, panting. If she could have heard herself, she'd have been horrified, but she couldn't hear, couldn't do anything but feel. Sensation after sensation rocked through her, and she found herself holding on by a thread as his greedy, talented mouth ravaged hers. When they broke apart for air, he slid down her body, opening his lips wide around her nipple, using his tongue and his teeth to exact more dark, needy sounds from her. She watched helplessly as he drove her further toward the edge with just that tongue. Then his big, rough hand worked its waydown her belly, beneath the edging of her panties. Lifting his head, he gauged her reaction closely as his finger unerringly located the exact spot designed to drive her to the brink. She made some unintelligible sound, which turned into a moan when he lightly feathered it with the pad of his thumb. Her every nerve ending throbbed and pulsed and begged for more, but the fact was, she was out of her league. She had no clue, no road map and no guidance. She was parachuting without a damn parachute. "Wait!" "I don't think so, not now." He touched and stroked and mastered her, whipping her into a desperate frenzy. Staring down at her, his eyes were dark with desire. "You wanted this." With the finger that had become the center of her universe, he circled her opening, once, twice, making her cry out and move convulsively against his hand. "Didn't you?" "Yes," she gasped, thrashing on the bed. "Yes, I wanted this!" Galvanized into action, he stripped off his jeans, then made her clothes vanish as well. He ripped open a condom, his gaze devouring her as he put it on. Shamelessly needy, she pulled her knees back, opening herself to him in a way that was utterly foreign to her, but felt so right at the moment. His eyes all but gobbled her up. "You are so beautiful. And so mine." He pushed into her, just a little, just an inch, dragging a whimper of need out of her. "More." She thrust up to meet him. "Oh, yeah. More." He pulled his hips back slightly, and another little whimper shuddered inher throat, but then he thrust again, deeper this time. And then deeper still. And again, until he was so far seated inside her that she couldn't tell where she ended and he began. He held himself stil, then, looking down at her as a parade of emotions crossed his face: dazed wonder, harsh need. "Mike," she whispered, feeling all those emotions right back, and he thrust into her harder, deeper, over and over again. Her head fell back. She arched up into him. She was dying. "Mike." "Right here, baby. Come." He delved a thumb into the wet tangle of curls above where they were joined, stroking as she writhed beneath him. "Come for me." He was watching her. Waiting. Egging on all that sensation inside her until it came to a roaring explosion She'd never been watched before. It should have stopped her cold, should have left her unable to fal apart, screaming, panting, making an unholy fool of herself as she shuddered and jerked under the assault of ecstasy, but it didn't. And when she could breathe again, she realized she hadn't been the only one to completely lose herself. He'd collapsed against her, having banded his arms tight around her, holding her to him in a bone-crushing grip. Amazingly enough, they fel asleep like that. MIKE WOKE with a wide, canary-eating grin and yet another erection. Turning toward Corrine, al ready thinking about exactly what he intended to do to her, he stopped, shocked into immobility. She was gone. Again. Damn her! And damn him for allowing it. He should have handcuffed her to the headboard. Should have never fallen asleep. Should have.. .should have.. .should have. The truth was, there was nothing he could do to keep her, nothing at all. Unless she wanted to be kept. Which she didn't. 9 MIKE WALKED INTO the conference room and Corrine's heart took off like a rocket. "Good morning," she said coolly. No one had to know she was on the verge of death by mortification, or that her palms were damp with nerves, just from seeing him again. She'd left him blissfully, gloriously naked, fuly sated and fast asleep. He'd accuse her of being a chicken, but it hadn't been fear that made her run; it had simply been time to put aside all personal stuff and get to work. Here at work, she couldn't afford to be thinking of someone else, grieving over what could never be. Concentration was required. Time to put everything else aside and get on with her scheduled team meeting. No problem. Putting everything else aside had always come easy for Corrine. Until now. Mike didn't answer or return her greeting, didn't even acknowledge it. He looked tall, dark and royally pissed off, not to mention so beautiful he took her breath away. "Um...coffee?" she asked, gesturing toward the pot. The few sips she'd already taken were making her jittery. Or maybe that was Mike. "No, thanks." She busied herself adding sugar and cream to her coffee, though she preferred it black. But she needed in the worst way to not look at him. "Corrine." He was going to want to talk about it. She should have known. "Corrine." His eyes glittered with attitude and knowledge, knowledge that she'd run from him. Which really was proof positive that he could never understand her. His dark hair was still wet from what must have been a very recent shower, one in which he hadn't shaved, as witnessed by the dark, day-old stubble on his jaw. She knew that stubble, knew it intimately, knew how it felt gliding over her skin, the raspy sound it made when he lingered, and the citrusy scent of it. "Don't, he said in a gruff, almost harsh voice, and she was thankful they were the only ones in the room, because that voice made her blood start singing. "Don't what?" she asked as lightly as she could. "Don't look at me as if you can't take your eyes off me, because we both know that's not true." It was true, but she wasn't about to admit that. "I'm only looking at you because you're early. I'm surprised, is all." "I'm early," he said, stalking toward her with his long-gaited, very confident stride. "Because I woke up early. With a raging hard-on, as a matter of fact." She bit her lip and held her ground, forcing her chin up so she would look fearless. Which she absolutely was. Fearless. Nothing got to her, nothing... except for maybe, just maybe, this man. "I thought all men woke up that way." "Yes, but I woke up expecting to be wrapped around a warm, sleepy woman." He was nearly upon her now. "One whom I could slowly caress and kiss and taste until she was wide awake and writhing beneath me, making those soft, desperate sounds, which, by the way, are the sexiest I've ever heard." "Mike—" "And then when I had her that way," he continued in a soft, silky voice, "I was going to slowly sink inside her, one inch at a time, until—" "Stop," she whispered desperately, weakly, glancing at the open doorway. But no one else had arrived yet. She was shaking, damp from perspiration, just at his words! Did she really sound soft and desperate when he was buried deep inside her? And did he really think she was sexy? No one had ever told her such things. No one had ever even thought them of her, she was quite certain. "We can't do this here." "Oh, yes, we can." His eyes were flashing, and despite his unbearably sensuous words and soft tone, his mouth was grim. "We can do this here, because you're not going to let me do it anywhere else. I might be a little slow on the uptake, Corrine, but I'm not stupid." No, no he wasn't. And he really was furious. She supposed he had a right, but she had a right, too. And damn it, hadn't she told him nothing could come of this...this thing between them? It wasn't as if she'd led him on, or purposely set out to hurt anyone's feelings. Besides, if anyone was going to get hurt here, it was going to be her. Because she couldn't fool herself any longer; he was magnificent. And he wouldn't stay single for long. Some other woman would come along and snag him. But she...she would forever pine over what might have been. "I realize you're upset—" "Upset," he repeated in a quiet, reasonable voice. He even nodded. But he didn't stop coming toward her. "Yes, you're right about that, Corrine. I'm upset." "I know." Not alowing herself to back up, she reached behind her and gripped the conference table for support. "I do know. But—" "No, I don't think you do." He stopped a breath away from her, so close she had to tip her head back to see into his face, but no way was she going to retreat. She retreated for no one. "I'm beginning to realize you know nothing about me or my feelings," he said. "Nothing at all. In fact..." He tipped his head and studied her for a long, squirmy moment. "Maybe you really are the Ice Queen everyone says you are." She couldn't even open her mouth, his words cut such a deep wound. Her hand came up to rub at the sudden ache in her chest and she was half surprised to find no sign of blood. "You...you think I'm an Ice Queen." "Look me in the eyes and tell me you're not. Tell me you're not frozen to the emotions running wild within me. Do it," he begged softly, reaching out, trying to make her look at him. But she was done. Done with this, and done with him, because damn it, he didn't understand at al, and she wasn't about to try to make him. Not when all her life she'd had to explain herself, except with her family. They'd always accepted her just as she was, and she'd always believed that someday, somewhere, she'd find that same acceptance elsewhere. And when she did, she'd always promised herself, that would be the man she'd marry. It had never happened, not yet anyway, and she was beginning to believe it never would. Another bitter disappointment, knowing love, true love, always eluded her. "Corrine." His voice was so soft, so urgent, so utterly gripping. She lifted her head, but Stephen entered the room just then, followed by Frank. "Ready to rock and roll?" Frank asked, rubbing his hands together with glee. Nothing made Frank happier than a SIM, which was what they were going to be