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“Bed,” he said after a minute. “The floo
r would be a crime.”
“That way.” She pointed over his shoulder.
Fastest way to get there was to carry her. He lifted her by the hips and kissed her again as she wrapped her legs around him. They bumped hard into the wall in the hallway when she ground against his cock with a breathy little moan. He toed off his shoes on her bedroom carpet and kneeled on the wine-red comforter with Ellen plastered to his chest, her face tipped back to kiss him.
They fell onto the mattress together, a graceless dead weight, though he managed to get his elbows under him so he didn’t crush her.
This wasn’t what he was supposed to be doing, but it felt right. Ellen felt right. Sometimes, that was all you had to go by. Caleb stared down at her, her face shadowed in the dim room, her eyes liquid and luminous, and made his peace with it.
She tugged his shirt out of his slacks. “Get this off.”
“That sounded suspiciously like an order.”
She tipped her hips up, rubbing hard against him and making a low, needy noise in her throat that pretty much did him in. Her nipples brushed against his chest through his shirt, and he had to taste them. To watch her move, naked, underneath him.
It was possible she’d come to her senses later and hate him for this. It was even possible he’d get fired for it. Unlikely, but possible.
It didn’t matter. Only a very stupid man would turn down what she was offering him, and he was not very stupid. Out of his head with lust, yeah, and maybe only moderately intelligent on a good day, but not altogether stupid.
He had enough brain cells left to unbutton a shirt.
As he sat up, still straddling her, she smiled her show-stopping smile and asked, “So you still take orders?”
“From you, apparently I do.” He leaned way out and fumbled with her bedside lamp until he found the switch. Light spilled over her hair, which spilled over her pillow. Gorgeous.
“Did they call you ‘Sarge,’ like on TV?”
That she knew his rank made him smile. She must have asked Carly. “They say it more like ‘Sar’nt.’ ”
“And if I order you to make it fast, and hard, and rough, Sergeant Clark …?”
She slid her hands up underneath his shirttail to splay across his stomach. With a shudder, he closed his eyes and fought to tamp down his response. She was so provocative, so freaking hot, but there was an innocence to her, too. He wanted to fuck her silly and shelter her at the same time.
Probably better pick one.
“Is that how you like it?” he asked, though he fully intended to find out for himself. He was going to figure out everything Ellen liked, and then he was going to do it to her as many times as possible. “You want me rough?”
Something flickered in her eyes then, so unexpected and gone so fast he nearly missed it. But he couldn’t miss it. He knew what fear looked like. He’d seen every variety of fear. Felt most of them, too.
“Hey,” he said, capturing her wrists underneath his shirt. He removed her hands and rolled off to one side, interlacing their fingers. “Hey, Ellen. Look at me.”
She didn’t seem to want to, but eventually she met his eyes. “You afraid of me?” he asked.
“No.” And she meant it, he could tell. But she was worried about something. She’d gone too quiet, too enclosed all of a sudden, where before she’d been brash and playful.
“I was just teasing, you know. I would never hurt you, or do anything you didn’t want me to do. Never.” He traced the outline of her face with one finger. “I promise.”
She nodded, accepting his statement. “I know that.”
“You want me to leave?” He didn’t know what else to say. In his mind, he was already walking out of the room, already trying to figure out what had gone wrong. Other than the obvious—that he was bigger and stronger than her, and damn near a stranger. Of course she was having second thoughts. He was an ass.
She shook her head and said, “I want you to take off that shirt.”
Not the answer he’d expected. And he couldn’t have kept the slow smile from spreading over his face if he’d tried.
He kissed her, softer this time. Testing the waters. “You’re sure?”
