"Faster," she demands.
"No." I keep the pace slow and grinding, pulling nearly all the way out before sliding deep again. Her breath hitches with every thrust and her hips try to force a faster rhythm and I hold her down and make her take it at my speed.
"You are the most infuriating man I have ever..." She loses the end of the sentence when I angle my hips and hit the spot that turns her articulate fury into a strangled moan.
"Most infuriating man you've ever what?"
"Shut up and fuck me, Senior Chief."
The title in her mouth, pitched low and breathless and deliberately provocative, almost finishes me on the spot. My hips stutter, and the grin she gives me through her flushed, wrecked expression is so pleased with itself that I have to shut it down or I'm going to lose this round.
I pin her hip with one hand, drive deep, and stay there. "Say my name."
"Make me."
I grind against her, slow and hard, and her eyes roll back. "Say it."
My name breaks apart on her tongue, half moan, half surrender, and the sound of it pours through me like accelerant.
I stop holding back. My pace goes hard and deep, the rhythm easily catching fire, and she matches me stroke for stroke, herbody moving under mine with the strength and fluidity of an athlete.
The bed frame hits the wall and her nails score lines down my back and her voice fractures into cries that are desperate and raw and mine.
I feel her climbing, feel the tightening clench of her body around me, and I slide my hand between us and press my thumb against her clit.
She comes apart with a scream she doesn't bother muffling, her body locking tight around me, and the pulsing grip of her orgasm drags me under. I bury myself deep and let go with a guttural groan, spilling inside her while her body milks every last pulse.
Afterward, she's asleep in minutes. Her breathing is deep and even, and her face against the pillow is soft and open, and her hand rests on my chest in the possessive, unconscious way of a woman who reached for what she wanted and has no intention of letting go.
I am not asleep. I am lying in Ireland Calloway's bed with her body curled against mine and the quiet of her townhome around us, and I am listening.
At 0237, the scrape comes. Metal on metal, quiet enough to be nothing, specific enough to be everything. It comes from the back of the house, the direction of the patio door, and every nerve I own fires simultaneously.
I go from resting to operational between one breath and the next. My hand lifts from Ireland's back without disturbing her weight. My feet find the floor without sound. The Sig is in the nightstand on my side, because I put it there this morning while she was in the shower, and the grip is familiar and cold and feels exactly as it should.
Ireland stirs. Her eyes open, and in the half-dark I watch her register the weapon in my hand and the way I'm standing andthe absolute stillness of my body, and whatever she was about to say dies in her throat.
I hold one finger to my lips. She nods. She doesn't speak, doesn't move, doesn't make a sound.
I pull on the pants I left on the floor and I'm down the stairs in the dark on bare feet, moving with the silent, controlled fluidity of a man who has cleared buildings in places where the penalty for noise was death.
The layout is mapped from last night's sweep: furniture positions, door locations, the angles of approach from every window and entry point. The patio door is at the back of the living area, glass and frame, the lock I checked twice before we went upstairs.
I hear it again. A tool against a lock mechanism, someone working the hardware with skill and patience.
I press my back to the wall beside the patio door and look through the edge of the glass. A shape. Low, dark, crouched near the lock. Moving with the economy of someone who has done this before.
I raise the Sig and thumb the light on the tac rail.
The beam hits the figure full in the face, and they bolt. Gone in the time it takes me to register dark clothing, gloves, a build that could be male or female, and the practiced speed of someone who expected to encounter a locked door and not a weapon.
I clear the exterior. Perimeter sweep, fast and thorough, every shadow and angle and blind spot. The street is empty. The neighboring townhomes are dark.
Back at the patio door, I inspect the lock. Tool marks on the plate, fresh scratches in the brass where something thin and flat worked the mechanism. Whoever was here brought the right equipment and the right training and the wrong assumption about what was waiting inside.
I pull out my phone. Rivera's number. The call connects on the second ring, because NCIS agents sleep the way SEALs sleep: with one ear open and a phone in reach.
"Rivera. Boone Aldridge. Someone just attempted to access Ireland Calloway's townhome through the rear patio door. Tool marks on the lock. Suspect fled on foot approximately two minutes ago, heading east. I cleared the exterior. No contact."
