God, she was so pretty. Her eyes were huge, her skin soft, and her lips were right there. What he wouldn’t give to sink right into them. Into her.
“I’m not going to do that to you. Or to me. I don’t want to be thinking about you when I should be focused on my men. On whatever it is I need to remember—”
“I get it.” She’d interrupted him, her voice low, but she repeated it louder when he stopped talking. “I get it. I don’t like it, but I’ve learned that when a marine gets stubborn, there’s nothing I can do to change his mind.”
He frowned, startled by a sudden surge of jealousy. “You spend much time with marines?”
She laughed, the sound light, and it warmed him despite the fact that he was putting the brakes on their relationship. “Let’s just say that in some ways, there’s little difference between a stubborn marine, a stubborn air force officer and a stubborn six-year-old. You’re not going to listen to me. All I can hope is that you’ll catch a clue and come knocking on my door sometime soon.” Then her eyes met his. “No strings attached.”
His breath caught. She was offering him a fling. A no-strings-attached hot—
She kissed him. She had to go up on her toes to do it, but one second she was looking at him and the next her mouth was pressed up to his. And she was doing something with her tongue that shorted out his brain.
A split second later, he wrapped his arms around her and drew her tight. Her mouth opened beneath his, and he went straight in. He heard a soft sound, a womanly sound that was half delight, half surrender, and his blood fired hot. He pressed her against her door and owned her mouth like he was staking a claim.
It went on for much too long. Or not long enough. He adored the feel of her, soft in the right places and solid in the rest. She kissed like a dream, and he was finally skimming his hands underneath her shirt when a noise in the hallway alerted him.
It was nothing really. Some kids were playing outside. One of them laughed, loud and raucous. But he was a marine and trained to pay attention to outside noises. To realize that he was about to strip her naked in a public hallway. And to know that this was a bad idea even though every cell in his body was pushing him to take the two steps into her bedroom and do what they both wanted.
So he broke the kiss, dropped his forehead against hers and just breathed. Breathed in, breathed out. And waited for the lust to fade.
It took a really long time.
“I’ve lost you, haven’t I?” she said, her breath curling about his neck and kicking his pulse into overdrive.
“It’s too fast,” he said. “I can’t think.”
She laughed, though the sound was forced. “I never thought I’d be the one trying to convince a guy to have a summer fling with me.”
His body tightened against her despite his intention to pull away. She gasped and his blood roared. But he was a man, damn it, not an animal. He was not a slave to his lusts, and he would not walk down a road that he knew was wrong. Despite her words of a summer fling, she would fall deep and hard. She was just that kind of girl. And, truthfully, he was that kind of guy.
“I don’t have summer flings,” he said. “I don’t have a girl in every port and I don’t seduce women just because it will feel so damn good.”
She touched his face, her fingers gentle and her question honest. “Why not?”
“Because when I go for a woman, I go for keeps. I proposed to my high school girlfriend and when I caught her with someone else I joined the navy. I’ve dated other women, but they weren’t right and I knew it.”
She let out a little moue of regret. “So you already know I’m not the right one.”
“I don’t know any damn thing!” he snapped, his frustration making his hands fist against the wall. “I only know that I can’t remember and that I have to and you’re a distraction.”
“Sometimes a distraction is a good thing. Ever think you’re trying too hard?”
“Every damn day. But I can’t not think about it either.” He forced himself to step away from her. It was hard, but he did it. “I’m messed up, Christy. Which means that this is not the time for me to do anything with a woman. It’s not fair to either of us.”
She nodded. The gesture was slow and filled with an embarrassed kind of pain. He’d rejected her and that had to sting. But he knew she understood. He wasn’t rejecting her, he was rejecting the situation. Romance was not a complication he could afford right now.
“Maybe after I remember … After I figure out—”
She held up a hand. “Don’t make it worse, Jason. You’re not ready for anything more. I get it.” She sighed. “And you’re probably right. I don’t know that I’m good at flings either.”
It bothered him that she was even thinking of a summer fling. It bothered him in a Neanderthal kind of possessive way, and he ruthlessly pushed that thought aside. Meanwhile, she opened her room door.
“I think I’m going to take a shower now. Maybe a bath too.”
He didn’t understand what that meant, but didn’t comment on it. “Good idea. I might do the same.” Though the idea that they would both be wet and naked some few feet away from each other was not going to help their situation.
“I still had a great time today, Jason.”
“Yeah, me too.”
She looked like she wanted to say more, but in the end, she gave him a little wave and stepped into her room. He stood there watching the door close, feeling like a rejected suitor—and the irony of that wasn’t lost on him. Then he shoved his hands into his shorts and headed for his own shower: a cold one.
It worked for a while. He managed to not think about her for at least two or three seconds. He grabbed some dinner and ate it morosely, all the time wondering what she was eating and what she would think of the soggy fries or the bad O-Club decor. And when he wandered back to his room that evening, he looked at the stars and remembered how she had been so excited at seeing the dolphins.
And then he went to bed and dreamed about her.
CHRISTY WAS DREAMING. She knew she was dreaming because she felt no pain. She was walking through the base on her way to the swimming pool and her knees didn’t creak, there was no persistent ache in her hips, and even her spine felt like it was fresh and new.
She took a deep breath, loving the feel of such easy movement. And as she exhaled, she saw him: Jason. Adonis rising from the depths of the swimming pool, his body all sleek and golden. She saw his scars with new understanding now. She recognized the anger that haunted his expression and added a clipped edge to his gestures. She knew the source now, and her heart ached for him.
But this was a sunlit dream, and there was no time for pain here. So when a child ran past her chasing a Frisbee, she laughed at his antics. He tripped over something, but he scrambled to his feet and ran on. If she wanted too, she could run after him.
