SHE LAUNCHED HERSELF AT ME.

Arms around my neck, tight body slamming into mine, her tongue swept at my mouth.

Out of my fucking mind, I let it happen.

That’s where shit should’ve ended. Fuck, I was a Force Recon Marine. I saw it coming. I knew her intent before she’d made up her mind. A single tactical maneuver, and I could’ve avoided the whole damn thing.

Except I didn’t.

And I sure as fuck didn’t let her kiss me.

Grabbing her hair and fisting, I growled against her lips and did what any self-respecting Marine would do.

I fucking kissed her.

Driving my tongue into her mouth, I claimed her like I had a right to. Her body, her will, they bended, and for one sweet, submissive moment, I forgot she was nineteen.

Until she kissed me back.

Tangling her tongue with mine, biting my lip, taking what she wanted, she didn’t kiss like a nineteen-year-old.

Despite her body pasted against my chest like her brand of submission was made for me, she didn’t just keep up with me, she gave as good as she got.

Bullshit possessiveness hit me like the fucking IED blast that took out my military career, and every damn one of my muscles froze. This wasn’t an inexperienced teenager. This was a woman, and she knew what the fuck she was doing.

My fist tightening, I breathed through irrational anger and yanked her head back. “Who the fuck taught you to kiss like that?”

Her lips wet, her eyes wide, her fingers played a game of seduction across the back of my neck. “What?”

Voice innocent, body submissive, mouth like a porn star, she was a walking contradiction, and my cock stupidly wanted in on it. “You don’t kiss like a nineteen-year-old.” I remembered high school. She wasn’t that.

She frowned, and her fingers stilled. “You don’t like the way I kiss?”

“Don’t fuck with me,” I warned, still holding on to her. “That’s not what I said.”

Her throat moved with a swallow, and the attitude I was expecting never came. “I’ve kissed men before, Shade,” she said quietly.

Using my name, the lack of reproach, her calm explanation—it all threw me. Not only did she kiss better than the last ten women I’d been with combined, she was acting too damn mature for her age.

I didn’t fucking like it.

And I sure as fuck didn’t like the fact that my goddamn thoughts were going down this road. I couldn’t think about how tight her nineteen-year-old cunt would be. My cock would destroy her faster than she could beg me to stop.

Reminding myself that I wasn’t the kind of man she could handle, I let go of her and stepped back. “You know why we’re here?”

Suddenly looking lost as hell, she shivered. “What?”

Fuck me, I wanted my hands back on her. I wanted to erase the uncertainty in her eyes. “Do you know why I pulled over?”

“No… Yes.” She inhaled. “Maybe?”

“Christ.” I couldn’t do this shit. “Get in the car, woman.” She deserved the fucking title. No teenager kissed like her.

Not moving, her calm voice came back. “Why don’t you tell me why we’re here?”

“Don’t fucking play me.” She could figure it out. “And don’t make me put my hands on you again.” I might not let her go until I did something she’d regret more than I would. “Get in the Escalade, Summer.”

Her voice quieted. “You don’t want to touch me?”

Exact opposite. “Get in.”

“I’m not sorry,” she blurted, turning back into the nineteen-year-old. “For kissing you, I mean. I’m not sorry about that.”

“That makes one of us.”

Her face fell. “You didn’t like it?”

Too damn much. Which was exactly the problem. I had no business fucking with her. Experienced or not, she was too vulnerable, too damn young, and way too fucking used to getting what she wanted. It didn’t matter what the hell my cock thought, everything about this was off limits.

“Time’s up.” I grabbed her around the waist and unceremoniously dumped her in the passenger seat. Slamming the door before she could say anything else, I told myself to pull my shit together as I walked to the driver side.

“Fucking Christ,” I muttered before yanking my door open and getting behind the wheel.

She was quiet till we were back on the highway, doing ninety in the left lane.

Then she shit all over ever preconceived notion I had of her.

“I’m sorry. That was all my fault back there. I selfishly wanted something, and I didn’t think.” Her gaze, pure as fuck, cut into me. “I took without asking, and that wasn’t right.”

Who the fuck was this chick?

I didn’t ask.

I fucking drove.