Leaning forward, he kissed her gently, his hands falling to her belt. She was breathing hard, shaking, anticipating the moment when he touched her….
Unable to keep herself from it, she ran her fingers over his hard-as-rock abdomen, careful to avoid the bandage. He shuddered and moaned low in his throat when she ran her fingers over his pebbled nipples. Then he was tugging her slacks down, and she kicked them off. Next came her panties. He quickly removed the rest of his clothes. Never taking his eyes from hers, he kissed her. A groan escaped her when he brushed his palms over her breasts. Then he was touching her belly, caressing her hips, then the tender flesh between her legs. Sensation swamped her when he slipped two fingers inside her and began to stroke her.
She could feel her body pulse in response.
“Zack,” she whispered. “Please.”
She couldn’t believe those words had come out of her mouth. She couldn’t believe she’d meant them. Emily had never been a sexual person; she could go for months without so much as a single sexual thought. But being with Zack like this, wanting him with such intensity, was driving her to do and say things she would have never imagined.
Then he was over her, smiling down at her, but there was an intensity in his face she’d never seen before. A serious look that told her there were no pretenses between them.
Lifting his hand, he brushed the hair from her forehead. “Open to me,” he said. “Let me inside you.”
She could feel her body thrumming, her heart hammering against her ribs. He entered her with devastating slowness. She felt her body melting around his as she was filled to the hilt. Sensation rose in a swift tide to sweep her away. Then he began to move, and pleasure exploded into ecstasy.
Her body moved in exquisite time with his. For the span of a heartbeat they were one. One body. One heart. One mind. One soul. And when the heat reached a fever pitch, Emily came apart in his arms, shattering into a thousand pieces that would never be put together in quite the same way ever again.
Chapter Fourteen
Zack watched her sleep and tried not to think about what he’d done. The fire in the hearth cast amber light onto her flawless complexion. Her mouth was full and partially open, and it took every bit of discipline he possessed not to take her in his arms and make love to her again.
Exhaustion tugged at him, but Zack knew he wouldn’t sleep. His mind was too troubled. He’d slept with a woman while in the midst of a dangerous mission. Again.
Sometimes late at night he swore he could still hear the shot that had killed Alisa…
Restless, he rose and slipped into his pants. The cabin was chilly so he piled wood in the hearth. Then he walked to the window looking out over the snowy forest and tried to think of a way to salvage the mission. Instead he found himself cursing fate for sending this woman to him when there was no way in hell he could have a relationship with her.
“Zack?”
He started at the sound of her voice and turned to find Emily standing a few feet away. She was wearing her uniform shirt. Silhouetted against the yellow light from the fire, she looked slender and lovely and so tempting his heart ached just from looking at her.
“Go back to sleep,” he said, surprised by his hostile tone.
She cocked her head. “What’s wrong?”
“I need to think and I can’t do it with you standing there half-naked.”
She blinked as if she didn’t understand. When she started toward him, his temper flared. Couldn’t she see that this couldn’t lead anywhere? Couldn’t she see that the last woman he’d touched during a mission had died because of him?
Then her arms were around him and he felt the contact penetrate all the way to his bones. Need and desire coiled tightly inside him. He fought them, but his arms went around her anyway. When she fell against him, he set his chin against the top of her head and closed his eyes.
“I shouldn’t have let this happen,” he said.
“A lot of things shouldn’t have happened in the last two days, but I don’t think you were in control of any of them.”
He drew away and eased her to arm’s length. “I shouldn’t have been with you like this, Emily. I’m in the midst of a mission, for God’s sake.” Releasing her, he turned back to the window and rapped his hand hard against the sill. “Damn it.”
“Zack.” She started toward him.
“Stay the bloody hell away from me,” he said.
She stopped. “I don’t understand where this is coming from.”
He spun to her and immediately wished he hadn’t, because seeing her only made him want her and that ticked him off even more. “I’m trying to keep you safe, Emily. If something happened to you…”
“Nothing’s going to happen to me,” she said.
Angry because she was tempting him and he damn well didn’t want to be tempted, he crossed to her. He gently held her. “I’ve seen it happen. I’ve seen innocent people shot down. I’ve had friends killed because of me. I don’t want that to happen to you.”
“What are you talking about?”