Chapter Twenty-one
Candy stared at the closed door to her dark office. Her heart raced and stomach felt like it could empty itself through her throat.
This was pathetic. She’d been on the front line for a medevac. Bullets flying everywhere, grenades and RPGs exploding feet from her helo. Sand and dust clogging her sinuses, choking her lungs. And she was more scared at this moment than then.
“Director Tumbel—”
“Candy, relax. We’re adults; we’re allowed to be in the same room, alone,” Josh told her.
Irritation set her off. “Please, I know that. You’re hardly dangerous.” She gestured toward his prone body.
“Then sit next to me,” he offered, patting the rug close to him.
Oh shit, she thought. Maybe she should turn the lights back on. The glow from the fire softly lit the room, making it all romantic-like. But also giving her shadows to hide in. Lights stayed off. She turned and headed to her desk chair.
“I need to do some work,” she replied, hoping this would give her the distance from him to not succumb to his sexy everything.
“Then bring the laptop over here,” Josh said.
“I’d prefer not to. You need to rest to get better and leave.” Hint, hint.
He lay back, his hands settling behind his head, elbows in the air. “That’s fine. I understand your fear of shifters. Most people are scared when they first meet us.”
A chill ran up her back. She was not scared of anything. Including dying. And a sexier-than-hell man lying naked under a blanket in her office. Fuck! Speaking of coitus, she hadn’t done that in over a year. Okay, maybe it was years. Too many other things, like keeping her evac passengers alive, occupied her mind.
When a physical need arose, she’d work herself to exhaustion until the desire went away. After a few years, the basic human needs stopped coming, as well as all other emotions and passions and things that made humans human.
She leaned her face onto her hands, elbows resting on the desk. What the hell was wrong with her? A list of wrongs she’d be writing for days. Forget that. What was wrong with being with a man? It wasn’t like she was a slut if she did the wild thing with him. Because that would be exactly were it’d go if she got close to him. She felt like a virgin on prom night.
“For your information, Director, I’m not afraid of you or your agents,” she said.
“Prove it,” he dared her. “I bet you can’t sit next to me for five minutes.”
“You want to bet, huh?” she retorted. “What do I get if I win and if I lose?”
She saw him around the side of the monitor, smiling. “The same thing, baby. Me.” She leaned back in her chair and laughed. Full-on, belly-busting laugh. He was so damn cute when he said that. Like a two-year-old being so proud that he pooped for the first time on the potty.
She sighed, a giggle popping up—remnant of the laughter. “Fuck me,” she said under her breath. She closed the laptop, but kept it in hand, and stood. “All right, Director. You win. I’ll join you.” She glanced at the finger food tray next to him. “But only because I’m hungry, not because I’m attracted to you.”
“Who said anything about attraction? Not me. I just asked you to sit.” His smile was huge. Well, fuck her. She’d totally given herself away. This was going to be really bad. She’d be getting herself into a whole lot of shit. Some of it she wouldn’t know how to handle, but she was a big girl wearing her big-girl panties. Besides, didn’t everyone have a one-night stand with a gorgeous stranger in their lives? This would be hers.
And well, dammit, he’d made her feel special. That’s one thing in the army you didn’t want: to stand out, to be special in any way. Those who made impressions were the ones picked on the most. And she’d almost forgotten: he loved small arms as much as she did. Maybe they could talk guns for a while. Great idea! Now she felt better about this.
She plopped down on the fluffy rug next to him and pilfered a cracker with a sausage slice and cheese. “Did you know the ASh first came out in 2011?” she said.
“Do you know beautiful you are?” Josh asked totally ignoring her question. That shocked her. She was as plain Jane as they came. Well, she’d ignore his comment because a, she didn’t know how to respond, and b, she had no clue how to respond.
She continued, not missing a beat. “Shortly after that—”
Josh partially sat up and leaned toward her. His warm lips were over hers before she realized what was going on. All kinds of shit blew up inside her. More stuff she didn’t know how to respond to. The thought occurred to her that she’d forgotten how to kiss. When his tongue glided along the seam of her mouth, she opened more than her lips to him.
His lips were on hers. An instant fire burst in her veins and rushed through her body, pooling at her groin. She’d never felt anything like this. So hot. So raw. So desperate. Her hands crawled up his torso, tracing muscles, memorizing every delicious inch of him. She whimpered in the back of her throat and took and gave. Her heart thudded hard with every harsh breath shared between them. He kissed her neck, then her jaw. Her clothes came off in a rush of broken kisses and desperate pleas.
She moaned, her pussy aching for his attention. “Josh, please.”
“Soon, baby. Very soon,” he murmured, his tongue going around a circle over her curved belly and dipping into her belly button.
Her breaths reeled. Lord have fucking mercy. This guy was amazing. He continued his journey south, and she prayed she could survive this because she so wanted to know how it would feel to actually have an orgasm. Then he was there. His hot breath on her inner thighs. His cool tongue gliding over her heated flesh and working its way closer and closer to her pussy. She held her breath as his tongue dipped into her entrance, and she was lost to the bliss he was imparting on her pussy. He licked around her pussy lips and proceeded to fuck her with his tongue. She panted and ground her hips down, closer to his face.
“Please . . .”
She whimpered when he did a slow trail around her clit with his tongue.
“Tell me you want this, Candy,” he growled against her pussy, sending electric pulses up her spine.
“God, yes. I want this. I want you. Please, Josh.”
“Fuck, Candy. You’re sweeter than honey. I could eat you for hours.” He flicked his tongue twice over her clit. Her brain cells melted at that point. He rubbed his fingers up and down her pussy, wetting them with her dripping heat. Feeling his calloused fingers over her sensitive flesh turned into a new point of pleasure. She groaned and tightened her hold on the blanket. Her hips rocked on his face involuntarily.
He sucked on her clit while his fingers curled and thrust in and out of her. It took very little for her to go over the edge. Her heart pounded in her ears, each beat a fierce, wild gallop. Tension unraveled inside her, pushing her headfirst into an all-consuming orgasm. She screamed when a wave of pleasure rushed through her.
Panting like she couldn’t get enough air in her lungs, she blinked the haze of happiness away.
When he pulled back, she could barely move. Her entire body tingled, breathing in quick gulps. She guessed he didn’t want to talk about guns. He breathed deeply, moaned and lay back on the rug. “Candy, what you do to me is driving me crazy. You smell so good, yet you won’t let me do more. Why? What are you afraid of?”
There was that word again implying she was flawed, less than perfect, that she’d bow down to someone instead of ruling the roost. Her father knew exactly what he was doing when he reigned in the house.
She frowned. “I think I’ll just let you touch me a lot. All of me, actually. As I said before, I’m not afraid of anything.” Way to ruin the fucking mood. Literally.
“That’s not what your body is telling me. It’s says you’re frightened of something and need sex really, really, badly.”
Oh my fucking god. She wanted the fire in the fireplace to jump on her and burn her to ashes. No need. Her body was about to spontaneously combust from embarrassment, anger, and shame. She rolled away from him and started to get up to gather her clothes and leave. She didn’t give a shit if he was here all night by himself.
“No, wait, Candy. I apologize,” Josh said. His hand was on her forearm. She stared at it. Since physical contact was rare and far between in her life, when someone did touch her, it made an impact on her. The fingers wrapped around her wrist were strong, rough from manual labor. His palm was hot like he’d held it to the coals.
She met his gaze, his eyes glowing around the blue irises. The radiance brought up a long-forgotten memory. One that had tugged at her brain earlier. A time when she was young, before her mother—“Holy shit,” she let out. “My mother’s eyes sometimes glowed like yours.”
His look narrowed and he was quiet for a moment before asking, “Were those instances highly emotional for her?” Josh asked.
She didn’t want to think about those times. They were the worst. She looked away from him. “Yes.”
He rested his hand on her bent knee, sending goose bumps to her foot. “You have shifter genes in your family tree. That explains a lot,” he said, lying back.
Her head snapped around. “What does it explain? Tell me.”