RENDERED FUCKING SPEECHLESS, I STARED at her.

Goddamn.

No one had ever pegged me like that. Not that I gave any woman the chance, because the shit suddenly crawling around inside my head wasn’t a mission objective I ever dealt with. My chest tight, the urge to fuck her consuming, I laid stock still and stared.

Five and half feet of trust fund princess who was all tits, and she’s the one who finally brings me down?

Jesus fucking Christ.

I needed to get my ass in gear and go back downstairs. I should’ve been checking the surveillance cameras, calling Ronan for a sitrep. I needed to do any damn thing except lay here and think about my tongue in her mouth and my cock in her cunt, because nothing good was gonna come of this. Nothing.

But goddamn.

She inhaled and her tits swelled.

Fuck this bullshit.

No remorse, I slammed my mouth over hers and did what I’d been jonesing to do all damn night.

I fucking kissed her.

Controlled, pacing myself, I showed the woman restraint, but I didn’t want to. I wanted to strip the clothes off her full hips and lush tits and taste every damn inch of her body before I sunk inside her. I wanted to make her come so many damn times, she’d be begging me to stop.

Which is exactly what she’d do if I didn’t prep her first.

Stroking through her mouth, tasting victory when her tongue met mine, I refrained from grinding my hard as fuck cock into her ass and scaring the hell out of her. Forcing myself to pull back, I addressed the spot-on bullshit she’d said about me. “You may have hit the mark on some of the shit you said about me.” How she fucking pegged me, I didn’t know. I didn’t want to know. “But the only thing you need to know about me right now, princess, is that I’m going to make you come.”

Sucking in a sharp breath, she licked her lips, but her expression took a nosedive. “You can’t.”

I raised an eyebrow. “You don’t want me to touch you?”

“I didn’t say that,” she hedged.

I frowned. “You on your period?” Because I was past caring.

“No.”

I stared at her.

She stared back.

“Spit it out,” I demanded.

“I…” She looked away and her voice dropped. “Sex doesn’t make me come.”

Grasping her chin, bringing her eyes back to me, I forgot about my oath not to fuck her and asked the hard question. “Why not?”

Still avoiding eye contact, she shrugged. “Just…because.” She shifted in my grasp. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

Instinct hit like an IED blast wave. “You been hurt before?”

She shrugged again.

“Summer,” I warned.

Her gaze cut to mine. “It’s not a big deal, okay. I don’t care. Yes, I’m attracted to you.” She tried to push away from me. “It’s just not going to happen. Been there, done that. My body’s hard wired to get off on drugs instead of sex, I guess.”

I saw right through her. “Who was he?”

She turned her head as far away from me as possible. “Who was who?’

My jaw fucking ticked and my teeth ground. “The asshole who raped you?”

She flinched. “I didn’t say—”

“Am I wrong?” I wasn’t. It was written all over her face. And her attitude, hot and cold, cavalier and innocent, scared and bold as fuck, it all made sense now.

She didn’t answer.

Because I was an asshole, and because she was in my head, I pushed. “Tell me his name.” I was going to kill the asshole.

“There’s nothing to tell.”

“Now,” I barked.

She looked back at me and threw her hands up. “I was high, okay? It was my fault. I don’t know if I said no, I don’t know what I said. He did what he wanted, what all asshole guys do, and then he gave me more drugs.” Her eyes welled.” What was I supposed to do?” Tears slid down her cheeks, but her tone got angrier. “Say I didn’t want him to force himself on me when I was too fucking high to say no?” She swiped roughly at her face. “Yeah, that would’ve gone over real well.”

Rage like I hadn’t experienced since my last deployment consumed me. “Name,” I gritted out.

“Why?” She barked out a laugh void of humor. “It was my dealer. You already killed him.”

Rolling to my back, I shoved my hands through my hair.

“See? Now you know, and it doesn’t make any fucking difference except you’re disgusted by me, I’m disgusted in myself, and the whole thing was better left untouched.” She made to get up.

My hand around her arm, I caught her. “I’d dig the motherfucker up and shoot him again if I knew where he was.”

She snorted out a humorless laugh. “You can’t kill a dead man.”

A full magazine in his corpse would make me feel better though. “First of all, that shit wasn’t your fault. Second, giving drugs to a minor is a fucking felony. Third, you shouldn’t have to say no. Only a piece-of-shit fucks a woman too high to be coherent.” I rolled to my side to face her. “Understand?”

She looked away.

I fought from grasping her chin and instead did what I should’ve done before I kissed her. “I want permission to touch you.”

Her eyes met mine and her words came out with attitude, but the vulnerability in her expression about killed me. “You’re already touching me.” She moved her leg against mine to prove her point.

I kept stock fucking still. “I’m asking if I can put my hands on you. Intimately,” I clarified.

Her pulse jumped and her breathing picked up. She nodded.

“Use words, woman.”

“Yes,” she whispered.

I took her face with both hands. “You shouldn’t have had to say no. That piece of shit knew better. It wasn’t your fault. Understand me?”

Letting out a sound of frustration, she pulled out of my grasp. “I get it, but this conversation is pointless, and I’m done having it. The past is the past.”

For a split second I didn’t know if I was more impressed by her ability to compartmentalize or pissed off at her dismissal. I didn’t talk shit out with women. I didn’t lay in bed at night with them and rehash bullshit pasts or old wounds. And I never told anyone about myself. Except here I was, in a cabin I never imagined bringing a woman to, wanting to both kill the fucker who hurt her all over again, and give her words that’d mean something more than a useless platitude, but I couldn’t do either.

I could only make her come.

It wasn’t a matter of if, it was a matter of when. Her and I, we had chemistry. Since the moment she and her dark hair, big tits and sober self told me to fuck off, I wanted a taste of her.

Her age, my job, the fucked-up reason why we were here—everything about this was wrong. Which only made me want her more. Then she threw down with her little proclamation and I was done holding back.

“You know what I think?” It wasn’t a question. It was a challenge.

“That you’re God’s gift to women, you shoot better than anyone you know, and you’re invincible?”

Fighting a smile, I dragged a finger down her arm. “In addition to that.”

Her attention turned to my hand. “Gee, I couldn’t hazard a guess.”

“First clue, I’m not talking about myself.” Slow, steady, I brought my finger back up her arm.

“In a shocking twist of events, the invincible, humble bodyguard relinquishes the conversation to a subject matter not about himself.”

Fuck, I liked this. Yeah, I wanted to fuck her and prove her wrong about coming. I wanted to erase all her bad memories more than I wanted my next fucking breath, but this right here, the back and forth, no hidden agenda in her words, this shit was better than foreplay.

I smiled at her. “Name one thing you know about me that came from my mouth.”

“You don’t let a woman pay for a meal.”

Smirking, I dragged the back of my fingers along the side of her breast. “Something real, sweetheart.”

Her nipple hardened though her shirt. “That’s not real?”

I coasted my hand over it. “Not as real as these.” I palmed her huge tit.

Holding back a moan, she bit her bottom lip. “You’re an ass.”

“Tell me something I don’t know.” I winked. “You ready to come?”

She let out a laugh. “Because Mr. Invincible Bodyguard touched my breast and rubbed my arm?”

“No, because I’m about to show you how a real man takes care of a woman.” I pinched her nipple hard and she sucked in a sharp breath. “But just so you know, princess.” I leaned down to her ear and brushed my lips across the sensitive skin as I pinched her other nipple. “I’m not invincible.” First an IED in Afghanistan proved it, and now her.

Her eyes fluttered shut, her lips parted, and her sexy exhale told me all I needed to know before her fingers wrapped around my wrist. “I’m pretty sure going over the side of a mountain in an Escalade and living to tell about it makes you somewhat invincible.”

I smiled. “Still hung up on that?” I coasted my hand down her stomach and over her hip.

“I’m hung up on a lot of things in case you hadn’t noticed.”

My smile dropped. “I noticed, but I’m about to change one of them.” Fuck, I wanted to kiss her again. I never kissed women. I fucked them, dominated them, then left. Cara was the exception and a total fucking mistake. Refusing to think about her anymore, I focused on the woman whose orgasms had become my mission objective. “Listen up, princess. You’re going to do exactly what I say.”

Her hand slid up my arm and her fingers curled into the hair on my chest. “No, I’m not.”

“Yes.” Sure and precise, I cupped her. “You are.”

Her body jerked and her lips parted with a gasp. “Shade.”

I stroked her through her clothes. “That’s my name, woman. Remember it,” I demanded, bringing my mouth to her ear again as I slid my hand down her pants. “Because you’re about to scream it out when I make you come.” Thumbing her clit, stroking through her already wet cunt, I shoved two fingers into her.

Her back arched, and her mouth opened with a gasp.

Fuck me she was tight. “You feel that?” I rubbed her G spot as I circled her clit.

“Oh my God.” She spread her legs as wide as she could with her pants still on.

Dragging my teeth over her neck, pumping my hand faster, I rubbed her harder. Then I bit her hard as fuck nipple through her shirt.

“Shade!”

“Come for me, princess.”

She went off.