Mandy followed Marcus inside the house and toed off her shoes, leaving them beside the door. Marcus unclipped Cammie’s leash and bent to scratch the dog’s head. Neither of them had said anything during the twenty-minute ride home. For the first time in she didn’t know how long, she hadn’t a damn clue what to do with herself. She was comfortable in her own skin, comfortable with the opposite sex, but Marcus? He made her feel naked and exposed and way too vulnerable.
Marcus had that look. The one she’d seen too many times on Trent’s face that first year after he’d gotten out of the service. The one that told her he was lost in the past. It made her heart ache. She didn’t have to ask to know what—or who—he was thinking about.
She wanted to hug him, but she wasn’t sure he wanted her to or that she should, so she kept her hands to herself. “You’re quiet. Are you okay?”
Marcus finally straightened and turned to her. Small creases formed between his brows, and the corners of his mouth turned down as he tucked his hands in his pockets. “I’m sorry. I got to thinking on the way here.”
That he didn’t touch her spoke volumes. Neither did he even attempt humor. All of which told her none too subtly he was putting back up that impossible wall. A wall that, the more she caught of it, the more she wanted to breach and finally move beyond. None of which she should want. This whole night was pushing boundaries she shouldn’t allow, because in the end, she’d only get her heart broken.
Knowing all that didn’t stop the wanting, though.
She drew a deep breath, tried to prepare herself for the disappointment, and stepped toward him. She fisted her hands to keep from reaching out and touching him. “Would you rather be alone?”
Seconds ticked out in unbearable silence. Those intense eyes searched hers. Finally, he blew out a defeated breath, shoulders rounding.
“No. I’d like you to stay, but…” He hooked her around the waist and tugged her close, settling his hands on the curves of her ass. “My head’s not in a good place tonight.”
She didn’t have to ask to know what he needed. It was plain in the vulnerability in his eyes. He needed to hold and be held, to not have to sleep alone. She had the same need. It hit her more often these days.
Which was exactly why she ought to be going home.
God, did she really want to travel this road with him? Once she set this in motion, there was no going back. Another glance at the pain hanging all over him sealed the deal. She couldn’t not do this.
“Tell me what you need, Marcus.” She had a feeling she knew, but she needed to hear him say the words.
“You.”
She rolled her eyes, but couldn’t stop her half smile all the same. “How?”
He studied her for so long she was sure he’d shut her out, make some excuse. Finally, he sighed. His gaze locked on hers, those eyes intense and focused.
“I want to bury myself so damn deep inside of you I lose all track of myself. I want to feel you wrap your body around me, and I want to make you come so hard you scream my name. Because what I really want…is to get lost. Until I can’t think any more about the shit parading through my head. But I’m entirely too aware how selfish it is to want that, and I’m too damn tired for any of it.” He huffed a laugh and cocked a brow. “Sorry you asked?”
“Not even a little bit. You hold too much in.” She smiled, lifted onto her toes, and pressed a kiss to his lips, then stepped back and held out a hand. “How ’bout we just go to bed, hmm?” Marcus slid his hand into hers and Mandy glanced down at Cammie, who had yet to leave their sides. “You too. Bedtime.”
Mandy turned and made her way toward the bedroom. Cammie followed close on her heels. Once inside, Cammie leapt onto the bed, headed straight for the pillows, and plopped down. Mandy smiled before turning to Marcus. He didn’t argue when she reached for the waistband of his jeans or even attempt to stop her when she helped him out of them. He simply stood, watching her with those tired eyes. She took a moment to take off her own pants, crossed to the door, and flicked off the light, then grabbed his hand and pulled him to the bed.
She slid beneath the covers, waiting as Marcus crawled in beside her. He lifted his arm, and she settled against his side, resting her head in the crook of his shoulder.
After a moment, he drew a breath and released it. “It almost feels wrong to be here with you this way. A friend is dead. His wife is lying alone in her bed tonight, probably wondering how the hell she’s going to make it without him, and here I am with you. Living my life. Enjoying it.”
Mandy settled a hand against his chest, fingers stroking back and forth. “Guilt. That’s normal, you know.”
He cupped her face in the warmth of his palm, his thumb caressing along her jawline and skimming her bottom lip. “Mmm. So they told me after Ava died. Not that it stops me from feeling it. I can’t help wondering if we missed something. If there’s something we could’ve done to stop him. If he’d just…reached out. Called someone. Any one of us would’ve been there in a heartbeat.”
She stroked her hand up his belly to his chest. “It’s not your fault, and you shouldn’t blame yourself. I’ve watched you with the guys from the shop for a while now, and I can tell you’re a good friend. The choice was ultimately his. For whatever reason, he felt that was his only way out.”
He let out a harsh laugh. “Yeah, they told me that, too, when Ava died. How’d you get so smart, anyway?”
Mandy shrugged. “When Trent came home, I worried about him, so I did some research, spoke with a therapist who gave me some tips, things to look for, et cetera. In the end, though, it was his choice, whether or not he wanted to live. I just tried my damnedest to make sure he knew there were people who cared.”
He sighed. “Exactly what bugs the shit out of me. I didn’t, and I shouldn’t have missed the signs, because Ava had them, too.”
She turned her head, pressing a kiss to his chest. “It wasn’t your fault.”
“I know, but I’ve lost too damn many people.” He lay silent, staring at the ceiling, before he turned his head toward her. “Which is why I’m not willing to risk losing your friendship.”
The gruff, no-nonsense tone of his voice made her chest ache. He was reaffirming his “rules,” had set her back in her place and reminded her of the painful end, coming up fast. Eventually, she had to let him go, and the thought made her hurt all over. The sad truth stared her in the face, and she couldn’t deny it anymore. She didn’t want only his friendship. She wanted him. All of him.
Trying desperately to ignore the tangle of emotion coiling through her belly, she slid over the top of him, lying along his length, and stroked his bottom lip with a finger. “I refuse to argue with you. You’re worrying for nothing on that front. I’m not planning on going anywhere. Believe me, I’ve got the friendship thing down pat.”
Instead of answering, Marcus slid a hand to the back of her neck and pulled her to him, capturing her mouth. Deep and demanding and encompassing, his kiss stole her breath. His lips tangled with hers in an erotic play that made her forget to breathe. He sipped slowly, his supple mouth sliding over hers. Flicked his tongue against her bottom lip. Nibbled at one corner. Only to move back to those tender sips and tastes.
Mandy sighed into the connection and melted into him. By the time he finally came up for air again, she’d lost all sense of herself. There was only him. Breathless and shivering with an ultra-heightened sense of vulnerability, she dropped her forehead to his. “What was that for?”
His big, warm hands caressed her back, that intense, probing gaze burning through her for a moment. “I needed you today.”
“Anytime.” She pressed a soft, lingering kiss to his lips, then slid to his side again and laid her head on his shoulder. “I mean that.”
He was silent a moment. “Will you be here after the funeral?”
The bare whisper of his voice told her in no uncertain terms how hard it was for him to even ask.
She slid her hand over his belly and squeezed him tight. “I’ll be here.”
Marcus wrapped both arms around her and pressed a kiss into her hair. “Thank you. I’m not sure I could do it alone this time.”
* * *
Marcus halted in the kitchen entrance. The sight on the opposite end of the room calmed the choking haze of panic he’d woken with. Mandy stood at the stove with her back to him, wearing nothing but a midriff T-shirt and a pair of sexy, lacy panties. This morning’s pair allowed him a peek of her shapely ass. The scent of eggs and butter permeated the space, the sound of sizzling filling the silence as Mandy bebopped to a tune only she could hear.
He folded his arms and leaned against the doorway to watch her for a moment. He’d dreamed last night, something he hadn’t done in months. His PTSD came and went with no consistency. He’d have months of nightmares, of being hyperaware of the world around him, when every little noise was a grenade going off beside him. And then he’d have months of being perfectly fine.
Lately, he’d had a reprieve, but Jason’s suicide had brought it all back. This time, though, it was Ava he’d seen in his dreams. Her face had hovered over him last night, as if she stood beside the bed, smiling and happy. Right before the dream morphed into his worst nightmare.
It relieved the panic more than a little to find Mandy in his kitchen. She looked damn domestic, too, barefoot and half naked, curls mussed, cooking breakfast.
She looked entirely too right there.
He crossed the room, slid his arms around her waist, and buried his nose in her hair. His lungs filled with the scent of her, and the panic caging his chest eased.
Mandy jumped, darting a glance behind her, then blew out a breath and swatted his arm. “You scared the hell out of me.”
He rested his chin on the top of her head but couldn’t bring himself to release her entirely. “Sorry. Just needed to touch you.”
She turned her head, her forehead resting against his chin. “You were restless last night. Are you okay?”
“Mm.” He skimmed his nose down her neck, immersing himself in the heady scent of her skin, its incredible softness. She deserved honest answers, not his diversion tactics, but it still wasn’t easy to lay his emotions out before someone. Especially her. Mandy had wormed her way inside. Her body beside him in bed at night felt too good, like she belonged there, and her opinion mattered. If she thought him weak, he didn’t want to see the echo of it in her eyes.
All of which meant she’d become important and none of which he knew what the hell to do with. “I dreamed last night.”
She took a moment to turn off the burner and slid the skillet aside, then laid her arms over his where they rested at her waist. “What about?”
He followed her jawline to her ear, down the length of her neck to the curve in her shoulder. That soft vanilla and something uniquely her filled his nostrils with every breath and the last of the tension in his chest left him. “Ava. They come and go. It’s always the same one.”
Some part of his brain warned him, again, that he shouldn’t share, that he ought to keep their relationship simple. But there was something about her. The trouble she’d gone through for him yesterday flat-out awed him, and the lure of her pulled the words from his mouth anyway.
He sighed and straightened, pulled her back against him and rested his chin on the top of her head. “She’s always lost. I can hear her calling to me from somewhere far off, pleading for help, but I can never find her. In the end, I never get to her in time.”
“You’ll see her again. Happy and whole.” Her fingers stroked the skin of his forearms, lightly caressing the hairs there. Gentle. Soothing. Enough to send shivers up his arms. “That’s what Mom told us when Grandma died. That we’d see her again. Made me feel better when I was little, at least.”
“Heaven.” He nodded, his mind filling with memories. “When we were little, Gram made Ava and me go to church with her. Said it was important that we learn, so that we can decide for ourselves someday. She used to tell us something similar, that there was a place we all went when we died.”
“But you don’t believe.”
“I don’t know what to believe.” He didn’t think God, if there was one, wanted someone like him. He was pretty sure he’d failed several parts of that particular bargain. He’d killed people. Wasn’t that one of the Ten Commandments? Did it matter that they’d fired the first shots? Or that he’d done it to protect innocents? “It’s a nice thought, though, that Ava’s whole and happy somewhere. Not in pain anymore.”
“Speaking of your grandmother.” Mandy pulled away enough to turn in his arms, settled her palms against his chest, and smiled up at him, eyes alight. “When do I get to meet her, anyway?”
Yeah, okay, so he’d been putting the meeting off. The thought of taking this charade into reality made him more than a little nervous. When he’d made that date with Military Match, he’d wanted Gram off his case. Now? Hell. The thought of actually lying to her—something he promised her a long time ago he’d never do—no longer sat well with him. He still wanted Gram to relax, to not worry about him so much, but the truth was, his relationship with Mandy didn’t feel so phony anymore.
It was a fine line he was walking. For the first time in a long time, Mandy had him pondering his future and what he wanted from it. Was spending his life alone still what he wanted? When this month ended, would he really be able to let her go? To pretend she meant nothing to him more than a good roll in the sack?
That was the trouble. He didn’t know anymore.
He tucked a wayward curl behind her ear. “Gram said to bring you over for Sunday dinner. If that’s good for you?”
Mandy nodded. “Sunday’s great. I have a wedding on Saturday, and Friday will likely be the last-minute cram to make sure everything goes smoothly.”
He cupped her face in his hands, stroked his thumbs over her cheeks, for a moment lost in the incredible softness, in the light in her eyes. Then he pressed a gentle kiss to her lips. He was grateful to her. For so many damn reasons. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“This. And last night. I needed you, and you didn’t hesitate.” He’d grown up determined to rely only on himself. After all, Gram had had Ava to take care of; he hadn’t wanted to be another burden. Now here was Mandy, pushing past all his defenses in an effort to save him from himself. She awed him.
Mandy smiled, this one soft and understanding, and stroked her thumbs across his chest. “I told you. Anytime.”
“So you did.” He stared at her for a long moment, studying the lines and angles of her face. The emotion beat behind his breastbone like the pulse of his heart, steady, just beneath the surface. It had been beating around in his brain all night.
Mandy had ended up in his dreams as well. She’d hovered beyond his peripherals, a presence he could hear but not see. Calm and soothing, like an angel of mercy. He wasn’t sure he wanted to face the emotions he’d woken with. The panic at not finding her beside him. The desperate need to go in search of her.
He shouldn’t give them voice, either, but he couldn’t deny he felt them anymore. She made him want. Her sweet smile and soft kisses. The comfort of her beside him. And he wanted it every night.
He wanted her to be his, to claim her.
Despite the voice in the back of his mind screaming at him not to say the words, he dropped his forehead to hers and gave in to the pull to share. “I won’t deny you make me feel something, angel, that part of me wants…more. But I’ve done this before, and all I did was end up hurting her. I vowed to myself I’d never do it again, make promises I couldn’t keep. The last thing I want to do is hurt you like that, or risk losing your friendship when we figure out I’m just not relationship material.”
Mandy stared for a beat, those eyes reaching and searching, in that way of hers that made him feel naked. Like she could see all those vulnerable places inside. What scared the hell out of him was how intensely he wanted to let her see, to let her in. She was the first woman in more than four years to make it past his defenses, and God help him, but he liked her there.
She dropped her gaze and smoothed her fingers across his chest. “This isn’t ideal. I’ll give you that. But I enjoy this for what it is. I enjoy you. I’m not sorry I got involved with you. Not even a little bit. The fantastic sex is the icing on the cake.” She winked at him, sassy and full of herself. “So stop worrying about it and let yourself enjoy this.”
She patted his chest, her gaze a wash of emotion. Tenderness. Honesty. Even a hint of that playful impishness he adored. Then she rose onto her toes and pressed her mouth to his, a soft, lingering peck, released him, and turned back to the stove.
As she reached for the skillet she’d set aside, she darted a glance over her shoulder. “You pour the coffee. I’ll dish out the eggs.”