Carissa

I woke up disoriented, in a strange bedroom I didn’t recognize at first. Then it all came rushing back to me. My parents were trying to marry me off to the head of a human trafficking ring, and I still had somehow managed to drift off to sleep after Vaughn gave me a mind-blowing orgasm.

“Morning, beautiful.”

I yanked the sheet up to cover myself and shifted to look towards the door. Vaughn was standing there, dressed in nothing but a pair of pajama bottoms. They rode low on his hips, showing off the muscled V below his six-pack abs.

“Morning,” I gulped, my gaze jerking up to his face when he laughed.

“I hardly think it’s fair for you to cover up your chest while you sit there ogling mine.”

“It’s as fair as the fact that you’ve seen me completely naked, and this is the most I’ve gotten to see you,” I retorted.

“That’s easily rectified,” he murmured as he walked towards the bed. When he was only inches from me, standing so close I could reach out and touch him, he hooked his fingers in the waistband of his pajama pants and pulled them down his legs.

“Holy fucking shit,” I breathed out. I’d never seen a guy’s dick up close and in person. It was long and thick, pointing up towards his stomach. Veins stood out on either side, and it was almost a deep red color. I reached out and wrapped my fingers around his length, shocked by how big he actually was. “There’s no way this monster dick is ever going to fit inside me.”

“Your little pussy is so tight, it might take some work. But it’ll fit perfectly.” My hand clenched around him, and his hips jerked forward. “I can hardly wait to feel your wet heat wrapped around me. Your walls pulsing as you come all over my cock.”

“If you want me so much, why did you wait?”

“Because I had to be sure you were ready for that step. Your needs come first. Always.”

If I hadn’t already been falling in love with Vaughn, I surely would have started to in that moment.

“What if I needed to give you the same pleasure you’ve given me already. Twice.”

“I’d say we’re not keeping score, but I’m all yours. You want to touch me, to taste me? Go for it.”

The tip of his dick was glistening with pre-come, and I ran my fingers through it, slipping and sliding around. His hand came down to cover mine, tightening my grip around him. Then he moved my hand slowly up and down, going from the base up to the tip, then back down again. After a few strokes, he let go and watched as I worked his cock. The desire burning bright in his eyes, while his hips jerked in time with my strokes, filled me with a sense of awe. But it wasn’t enough. I wanted more.

“You said I could taste you. Can I really?”

“Hell yeah, you can,” he groaned.

I crawled off the bed, and dropped to my knees in front of him. Keeping a firm grip on the base of his dick, I flicked my tongue around the tip before sucking him as deep as I could go.

“Fuck!” He reached out to cup my neck, groaning as I swallowed. “You keep that up, beautiful, and I’m going to fill your mouth with my come.”

It had sounded like he’d meant it as a warning, but it only spurred me on. I wanted to send him over the edge, and when I hummed my agreement around his length, his hips jerked in response. I kept going until he plunged deep into my mouth and groaned with his release. With his hand wrapped around my neck, I swallowed him down.

“That mouth of yours,” he groaned as he pulled out. “Dangerous.”

Pressing a kiss to my lips, he pulled me close for a hug before lifting me up and tossing me onto the bed to return the favor. So much for not keeping track, but I wasn’t about to argue.

We spent four blissful days pretending the outside world didn’t exist. Going to bed wrapped in each other’s arms, and waking up the same way. Finding new ways to drive each other crazy with desire, while Vaughn worked on ‘getting me ready’ for actual sex. And then it was all blown to hell by one phone call.

I knew it was bad the moment his expression closed down. The light dimmed from his eyes, and his tone held no warmth when he told the caller to wait.

“I need to take this in the other room, beautiful.”

“Okay,” I agreed. Then I went and sat down in one of the chairs by the wall of windows and waited for him to return. I stared at the yard without really seeing anything. I wasn’t sure how much time had passed when he came up behind me and set his hands on my shoulders.

I tilted my head back, unsurprised to find him dressed like he’d been the night he’d come for me. “What happened?”

“Gaige was finally able to confirm that there’s nobody higher up than Bellamy. It’s the one piece of intel I’d been waiting on before I could take action.”

“What are you going to do?” I asked the question I wasn’t sure I wanted an answer to. Vaughn had been brutally honest with me about most things, but he’d avoided any mention of the specifics related to his business. Considering the kind of money he had and the lack of any reference to Alexander Bellamy serving time in jail for his crimes, I had a feeling he’d side-stepped the topic because the answer was going to be a tough one for me to accept.

“I’m going to do what the Army taught me,” he answered, his hands tightening on my shoulders as he spoke. “I’m going to eliminate the threat. Permanently.”

My head dropped forward as my breath caught in my throat and my vision became blurry when his words registered. I couldn’t speak. I didn’t know what to say. How to react to the knowledge that I was falling in love with a man who killed people for a living.

“I’m leaving someone behind to keep you safe. Her name is Sera. If anything goes wrong, do what she tells you. She’ll make sure you stay protected.”

He dropped a kiss onto the top of my head before he started to move away. Reaching out, I grabbed one of his hands and lifted it to my cheek. My emotions were a jumbled mess, but I couldn’t let him go into danger without saying anything. “Keep yourself safe, too,” I whispered.

“For you, always.”

I didn’t turn when he walked away. Or at the sound of low murmuring in the other room. I stayed put when the door closed behind him. And when Sera came into the room and introduced herself to me, I remained frozen, unable to talk, as she settled into the chair next to me. We sat like that for hours before she spoke.

“Guys like Vaughn, they don’t expect to find love. They think they don’t deserve it. That the sacrifices they’ve made for others somehow make them unworthy of a good woman. And with the path Vaughn took when he left the military, it has to be even more difficult for him to believe he’s good enough for you. Not because he doesn’t have enough money, because he does, but I think he’s worried you’ll think it’s dirty money. I get it. I really do. What he does probably isn’t the best way to earn a living, but he’s not a monster. The men he goes after are, though. He’s saved countless lives, both in and out of the Army.”

“Like mine.”

“Considering the kind of guy Bellamy is, yeah. He saved you, too. It’s why my team is here, because he’s done everything in his power to keep you safe.”

“I’m falling in love with him. May already be in love with him. But he’s a killer. I shouldn’t want to be with him, right?”

“All the men I work with are killers. Hell, I’m one too. But I trust them with my life each and every day. And my boss trusted Vaughn to make sure his wife’s kidnappers never have the chance to hurt her again. Considering Brecken is head over heels in love and ridiculously protective of his wife, that says a lot about how much he trusts Vaughn. And you know what? Vaughn looks at you the exact same way as Brecken looks at Hadley.”

I finally got out of my seat and paced the floor. “He does?”

“Like you hung the moon and stars in the sky.”

“What if I’m not strong enough to deal with what he does?”

“Vaughn is more than his job. He’s the man who hunted Bellamy down because he’s the one who found the body of a dead girl left in an alley. He isn’t here for money. He’s here to get justice for a girl who has nobody else looking out for her.”

I turned towards Sera in stunned surprise. “He never told me. I thought he was going after him because he was being paid to do it. Why did he let me think the worst about him?”

“Because he’s a dumb shit whose pride wanted you to accept him at his worst?”

That sounded exactly like the way male logic would work. “But he’s my dumb shit.”

“And also because he really does get paid to kill people sometimes,” she added wryly.

“Yeah, I’m gonna need some more time to wrap my brain around that one.”

“One thing I’ve learned in this life, we never have as much time as we think we do. Especially, not in Vaughn’s line of work.”

Thinking about the danger he was in at that very moment put things in perspective for me. I’d already fallen in love with Vaughn Westbrook. I just needed him to come back so I could tell him.