Page 7 of A Spark of Luck (The Defenders #2)

“I was wondering.” He took the cookie out of the bag and laid it on her nightstand.

“Wondering?”

“Whether you touching me in the hospital and zinging my body was a biological fluke or something else.”

His words sent a flash of that zing across her skin.

A raw, scary pitch took over her stomach.

Cait licked her lips, switching off all her mental arguments.

She lifted herself across his lap before she could let the doctor in her take over instead of the woman.

His hands fell to her hip to cradle her there and keep her from falling.

His eyes sparked. “Well, I guess that answered my question.”

“Yeah, I guess it did.” Maybe it was loneliness. Maybe it was curiosity. Maybe it was fucking Afghanistan. She touched him when she stitched him up, pretending she wasn’t affected. The warmth of him seeped into her pores and she didn’t want to stop. She wanted to snuggle in and so she did.

His lips were right there. Kissing him seemed like a mighty fine idea. He must have thought so too, because he tilted his head and leaned into her like there was nothing he wanted more than a taste.

Lips. Together. Bumping noses didn’t stop either of them.

The first sweet slide of lip-to-lip stole past her guard. Her hands moved to his face, the roughness of the stubble from his beard prickling her skin. He slipped his hands from her hips to her waist to pull her closer.

The kiss transitioned from polite and tentative to as raw and wild as the mountains around the base.

Her heartbeat thumped in her core. Her bones went liquid, and she collapsed against him to get closer.

He moaned and so did she. Desperate to taste, she pressed her tongue along the seam of his lips and requested permission to enter.

Her lips against his seemed so right she couldn’t stifle the need to press her breasts against his chest. Fingers at his nape, his tongue met hers and tangled her tight in a wave of shimmering want, beading her nipples, making her ache.

She broke away and followed the track of need, tossing the leash.

She squirmed apart from him to straddle his lap, sanity lost and not caring.

He kissed her again, his mouth demanding, so she let her tongue dance along with his.

With teeth and lips and tongues dueling, she let herself sink farther into the thank God wonderful feel of him and marveled he wasn’t pulling away.

In fact, his clever hands loosened her t-shirt from her waistband.

His palms skirted underneath, his warmth against her skin decimating boundaries.

Wild sensation rolled one wave after another, ripping down defenses that had only collapsed one other time – when she had touched him to fix his body.

His rough warrior caress flared a sense of belonging that did not make sense.

Thankfully, she’d already ditched her surgical top when she came through the door.

Now she pulled her T-shirt over her head wishing like hell she’d worn her black bra, not her utilitarian white.

Hunt’s hands kept her balanced. She mourned the loss of his mouth for those seconds it took to sweep the shirt away because a responsible thought rose to her attention.

Hunt eased back. His eyes swept her face then dropped to her breasts. His fingers released the fasteners at her bra back and the fabric dropped leaving Cait bare – physically and emotionally.

“Beautiful.” Hunt whistled quietly, his hands caressing her skin.

He dropped his mouth to her neck, kissing and charming his way back to her mouth.

His hands stroked the shape of her breasts, and the burn in her lower body moved closer to inferno.

He was strength and pure iron will against her.

She needed this, needed him with an agony that enveloped her.

Every curve, every inch of skin was a throbbing pulse point waiting for what he’d do next.

She wasn’t idle by any means. Her brain was not functioning to argue herself in or out of doing her own exploration. Instinct guided her to the flame, the heat of him. The nape of his neck, the strength of his fingers, the firmness of his lips.

She didn’t do this. But would she ever get the chance to feel like this again? Lord, she was how old? Had spent more time saying no than saying why not.

“Doc, you better verbalize yes or no.” His eyes blazed with a keen light .

She cupped his face and stared into those eyes. “I’m half naked. So that would be yes.”

Hunt shifted to look at the bed. “This is the narrowest bed ever.”

“Don’t think you can maneuver?” She grinned at him, attacking his shirt. She wanted him naked, too.

“Oh, I can maneuver.” He shucked both his duty shirt, his t-shirt, and his restraint. She ran the pads of her fingers over his chest, fascinated by springy, dark hair and deep, obscene scars. She hurt for him, knowing from her work what kinds of injuries caused those scars.

“You look like you’re never seen a man’s chest before.” Hunt pulled on her hips to tuck her tighter to him, his erection rocking against her stomach.

Her panties wet, she fought against the need to shed every stitch – a battle she understood she wanted to lose. Sensation piled on, coming in rapid-fire bursts, leaving the art of breathing wedged in her throat and her vagina throbbing. This raw intimacy made her pause.

They were strangers except for a vulnerable moment in time. But then his fingers tweaked her nipples, and a crashing bolt arched through her body, changing her understanding of passion.

Some men could be left, and some could not .

Slow down .

With raw need raging through him, Hunt wanted to slam her down on the bed and take her.

He wanted inside her with a gut-tearing wish.

Yet, his brain, still partially engaged, wanted to seduce and savor.

He’d never done that before. His usual sexual encounter was to rush to the finish line because it allowed him to stay emotionally unavailable, leaving no one behind his shield.

He never allowed anyone inside his skin, inside his head, so he got the release he needed and walked away.

He’d learned to protect himself young, and those lessons multiplied with his job.

Yet this woman, her eyes a blue that skimmed sky and ocean, her face flushed and tender, tempted him beyond ecstasy.

Her fingers savored his skin, leaving his knees shaking.

Her mouth a hot, smoldering draw left him wanting kisses and more kisses.

Her skin smelled of apple blossom sweetness.

The so soft feel made him gentle his touch, cursing the rough calluses of his war profession.

He let himself do what he wanted, which was to cup her breasts, shape, and mold. Big or small didn’t matter to him because they were her. He kept his lips on hers until he’d learned enough of the shape to want his mouth on her nipples, too .

The little death. This wasn’t it. This was emotion torn asunder and wrenched out of him by the essence of her across his skin. Instead of forcing her under him like a marauding Viking, he turned and laid back, pulling her on top of him.

Her little squeak made him freeze, but she flowed against him like it was where she wanted to be.

“You froze.” She’d gone still above him. Then she moved as if to get off, and he stopped her by tracing her spine with his fingertips. Instead, she settled closer against him.

“I feel like we both should know better than this.” He dropped his lips to her neck and used them to lap up her warmth, her feminine musk.

“Not sure I care.” She tipped her neck to give him better access and dipped to kiss a scar. She licked her way to his nipples. “I’ll stop if you want me to.”

He cupped her chin and did what churned inside – kissed her, devoured her.

Her pulse pounded under his fingertips, and he forgot who should know better than what.

He swept his fingers down her back and shaped the globes of her ass in each palm.

Lord, a glorious handful crowded his senses, and the want erupted to have her naked against him.

In his lizard-of-a-male brain, he’d hoped for sex when he came here, but his higher brain function reasoned he should get to know her.

Again, not his usual modus operandi because frog hogs – the women who hung out to get a SEAL notched in their bedpost – didn’t really care. That wasn’t Doc.

He slipped his hands under the waistband of her scrubs – thankfully, they gave with the pressure – then under the waistband of what had to be bikini cotton panties, and the air backed up into his lungs.

Warm, soft skin molded under his fingers, Cait sighed in his ear, her mouth making little kisses and licks across his jaw and to his ear – heaven beckoned.

Hard as steel, he held his breath and tapped down on imagining her wet heat – necessary to stave off an unseemly reaction.

“Do you need me off you?” Cait’s quiet words were filled with concern, her fingers frozen on his belt.

“Don’t you dare. I need you naked. I need me naked.”

“Bring it, LT.”

“Let’s leave rank outside the door, Cait.” He tipped her mouth back to his and tasted, her mouth a place that felt like home.

She murmured against his lips. “Let’s.” Using her hands to lever up, she rolled off him to stand and shimmy out of the rest of her clothes .

Stunned, Hunt traced every inch of her, the pale color of her skin, the sweet berry color of her nipples, the blonde thatch between her long coltish legs. She bit her lip, her eyes a battle between pride and shy that nailed him right in the gut.