Page 5
Chapter
Five
ROSCOE
“ T ell me about yourself. I want to know everything,” I command.
“About me?” Her bubblegum pink tongue darts out, wetting her lips and setting my heart ablaze. God, I’d give anything to know how she tastes. Everything about her is so sweet and tantalizing, the ultimate torture. “There’s not much to tell. I’m a school teacher.”
“What grade?”
“First.”
I nod.
“Although I graduated last year, I still live near campus…” Her voice cracks, and she breathes hard for a moment. “I just don’t get it. Why Crystal and Tiff? They didn’t do anything to deserve this. They were sweet, happy people. And I spent my whole life following the rules, being the good girl, coloring in the lines, and doing everything right to have a nice, boring, safe life. Why did something so awful happen to us?”
“That’s the thing about bad stuff. What makes it so unjust. It happens to the wrong people. Often, the people least deserving of it. Like the members of my squad. They were good men with wives and girlfriends and families to come home to. They were honorable men, fierce in the thick of battle, loyal to the last man, disciplined. And while I was all those things, too, I also had plenty of hell-raiser in me. I was reckless, with no one praying for me except my parents. And yet…”
“And yet?”
“I’m the one who lived, and my brothers all died. Eight Rangers.”
“I’m so sorry,” she whispers, more tears streaking her flushed cheeks. Her fingers thread into my beard, stroking it gently as she touches her lips to mine. The move comes completely off-guard, filling me with a soul-deep yearning.
“Eat your food,” I rasp, looking away.
Out of the corner of my eye, I register the sting of rejection on her face. It pains me, but she has to know we can never happen.
“You need your strength,” I urge.
She hungrily eyes the pemmican in the leather satchel next to us, shaking her head.
“It’s for you,” I insist. “I’m used to going days without grub, but I need you to keep up your strength.”
“Are you sure?” she asks, stroking my cheek. “You’re my hero, so I need you ready to kick ass.”
“Always.”
She takes the bite, and my ravenous stomach lurches, watching her chew. I make an internal promise that one way or another, we will eat tomorrow. Whether it’s edible berries that have somehow managed to winter over, fish from one of the streams, or small game. I won’t let this woman go hungry.
What Ginger doesn’t know is that I fucked everything up when it came to this moment. If I hadn’t given up all hope, I would have a stocked and fueled ATV ready to take us back to my cabin, and I’d have a fully loaded Glock 19, my M4A1 Carbine and XM7 rifles, and my compound bow in case any unlucky game or a certain kidnapper crossed our path. As it stands, my lack of preparedness may not seal our fate, but it sure as hell makes everything painstakingly difficult.
“You’re upset. What’s wrong?” she asks without even looking at me. I have the strange impression she can read my energy or maybe my mind.
“There’s more I have to tell you.”
“Okay.” She raises her chin, eyeing me as if she’s ready to take whatever ugly truth I have to tell defiantly.
“Because I was being a fucking pussy today and almost ended myself, I don’t have half the shit I normally would to protect you. I ran my ATV out of gas, determined to make this my last day on Earth, and I didn’t bring appropriate provisions or clothes like I usually do. I fucked up, and you’re suffering for it.”
Her expression freezes as my words settle into her soul. Finally, she says breathlessly, her voice tinged with awe, “So, you’re telling me the only reason you ended up where we found each other is because you ran out of gas?”
I nod.
Awe throbs in her voice. “There’s no way any of this was a coincidence. You’re going to have me believing in God if you keep this up.”
I wasn’t expecting this reaction or how it makes my heart feel, like the walls I’ve built around it are crumbling. I furrow my brows, observing darkly, “You should be mad at me for my willful lack of preparation.”
The blonde shakes her head, snuggling against my chest. The feel of her flesh on mine…her tiny movements to draw closer are sheer torture. I want her so badly. I’m surprised my heart isn’t beating out the rhythm of her name. Maybe it is.
“As far as I can tell, you’ve spent your whole life preparing for this. You’re a million times more prepared than I could ever be. You’re my miracle, Roscoe. What’s your last name, by the way?” she asks with a little giggle at the end.
“Why the laugh?” I ask in a steely voice.
“Because we’re so close like this, and yet there are so many basic things we don’t know about each other.”
I know more than I need to. Like I want to keep her, claim her as mine. My eyes dig into her, my voice raw. “Vaughn. Roscoe Vaughn. And yours?”
“Harper.”
The cave falls silent apart from the crackling of the fire. Ginger’s fingertips dance over my chest, incinerating the flesh and stoking my yearning. But I’m damaged goods, and she deserves the kind of life I could never give her. Besides, this bubble of intimacy between us has to be an anomaly, something that could never happen in any other place or time. Right?
I have to distract myself. My fucking cock’s beside itself with need, something I’m afraid she feels firsthand, my rod pressed increasingly hard against her hip. She can’t ignore it forever, can she?
Clearing my throat, I say, “Blue.”
“Blue, what?”
“My favorite color.”
“Me, too. Specifically steel blue, like the Atlantic on a stormy day,” she answers.
“Like your eyes.”
She nods, smiling more broadly. “You don’t miss any details, do you, Roscoe?”
“Eye color is more than a detail. It’s the outer vestiges of a person’s soul.”
“For a mountain man of few words, that was rather poetic,” she says, cocking her head to the side.
I shrug, returning to our game, “November 18th.”
“So, you’re a Scorpio?”
“I guess. I never really paid attention to that stuff. What do you know about the sign?” I grasp at straws, trying desperately to deny the lust coursing through my veins.
“Scorpios are intense and mysterious, compelling and loyal, and easily made jealous. They hold grudges like no other, and…”
“And?”
“They’re supposed to be kind of kinky in the bedroom and very good lovers.” Her silky smooth voice sends throbbing pulses of longing through me.
For fuck’s sake! I’m supposed to be getting my mind off sex, not making it the topic of conversation. Nevertheless, I shrug, none of what she says sounding too far off. “When’s your birthday, Ginger?”
“April 10th.”
“So, that makes you a…?”
“An Aries.”
“Tell me about that sign,” I command, running my hand through my hair. I’ve never been interested in astrology, but the more I learn about Ginger, the more I need to know.
“Aries are supposed to be adventurous and confident, passionate and impulsive. But that’s not me…”
“Because you’ve been too busy doing things right … trying to follow the rules?”
“Yes, because Aries can also be controlling and perfectionistic…even to themselves.”
“That must be exhausting, fighting against your true nature all the time.”
She nods against my chest. “It has been, and I’m done with it. Playing the good girl has gotten me nowhere. When I was in the Jeep, I had so much time to think about all my regrets. All the things I’ve never experienced. It came with such clarity of thought, such obvious realizations about the lie I’ve led my whole life. I don’t want to be the nice girl anymore. The sweet, obedient one who never causes any trouble, never rocks the boat. I want to be adventurous and bold and do daring things. Lead a messy life rather than a safe one.”
“You’re off to a damn good start,” I chuckle, wrapping myself more tightly around her. I bite the inside of my cheek, weighing my next words carefully. “You have a fire in your eyes that I catch glimpses of every now and again. It’s the wild woman inside you. Maybe you should try letting her out.”
Her eyes flicker to mine, and I see it again. It could undo my best-laid plans to keep Ginger at arm’s length. But fuck is it mesmerizing.
“Like right now,” I rasp, pushing a stray hair off her face. “I see it sparking in your eyes, threatening to incinerate everything in this cave.”
“Does it scare you?” she asks breathlessly.
“No, I like playing with fire.”
The corners of her mouth turn up, and her nostrils flare. Her eyes drop to my lips again, almost begging me to claim her. Fuck! I’m at my wit’s end.
Clearing my throat, I look away, asking, “So, what do you think triggered you to choose the good girl over the wild woman in the first place?”
“Well, for starters, the wild woman’s definitely not society-friendly…”
“Fuck society,” I grumble with a shrug of my shoulders. “Does the most sophisticated, dynamic city in the world really hold a candle to the forests surrounding us?”
“No,” she says, licking her bottom lip. “But cities don’t scare me like forests, either.”
“The forest scares you because you’re not used to it. But you could adjust, learn the ways of nature, learn your place in it.” Why the fuck am I trying to talk her into liking it?
“I’m not afraid with you here. But if I were alone… God, I can’t even imagine it.”
“The woods alone are no fun,“ I concede, feeling the words to the depths of my soul.
“Then, why are you out here all alone?”
“Because I got tired of hurting the people around me.”
“How, Roscoe?”
“By not being able to move on…”
“So, you chose to hurt yourself instead?”
“Acceptable damage,” I say darkly, staring at the fire.
Ginger strokes my beard, making me look at her. “No, it isn’t.”
She’s got me feeling too many fucking things all at once. I can’t take anymore. I need a break from her, from this delicious, terrifying intimacy, half ready to remove her from my lap and storm out into the chill of the blizzard. But my body rebels, refusing my mind’s commands. Desperately, I ask, “What about your home life?” I have to steer our conversation into safer waters.
“My parents divorced when I was eleven. I never saw it coming. In fact, I laughed when they told me, thinking it was a joke. But laughter turned to tears when I saw Dad’s packed suitcases. He never lived with us again, and in many ways, I felt abandoned by him. Especially after he remarried. Like he ran headlong away from trouble, leaving me mired in it. One thought plagued me after that. The thought that if I’d tried harder and been a better girl, my parents would have stayed together. So, I became a perfectionist. Getting straight As, following the rules, and doing everything right. It never reunited my family, but I guess it became a habit, providing a false sense of security against the uncertainties of life … until the kidnapping.”
I can’t help myself. Leaning forward, I kiss Ginger’s cheek, and her face glows with surprise. Her juicy lips part in a radiant smile, and I fight the urge to taste her mouth, drawn to the fire inside this woman even more than the flames warming the cave.
“My parents are divorced, too. Only it happened younger for me, a little before my seventh birthday. I was happy to see the bastard—I mean my dad—leave. Mom remarried my stepfather, Steve, and then proceeded to replace me with three younger sisters. Looking back as an adult, I see where I fucked up, too. I treated Steve like a total asshole, but he made me feel tolerated rather than loved. Maybe that’s why I gravitated towards the service or being the hero, as you put it. I needed to prove my worth to my parents and Steve. Prove it to the world. But my comrades’ death taught me that despite all the fucking heroics in the world, bad shit happens to good people.”
Ginger’s dainty hand clasps mine, intertwining our fingers. I swallow hard, feeling my whole body ache. “Your heroism changed everything for me,” she observes quietly.
My willpower’s in imminent danger of evaporating. So, I steer hard towards distraction through conversation. The only way to get my body back under control. “What else do I need to know about Aries?”
I can’t help myself. My fingertips slide back and forth over her dainty ones, savoring the feel of her small hand in mine, where it belongs.
“Umm,” she pauses. “We’re stubborn, and we’re supposed to be the best kissers in the Zodiac.” Her cheeks burn as she eyes me timidly.
Before I can catch myself, I exclaim darkly, “The best ones? Huh.”
Ginger’s eyes dance with seductive energy as I bring my hand up, palming her cheek and savoring its soft warmth with the thumb I stroke over it.
“Yes,” she whispers, her voice trembling, her cheeks glowing.
I can’t take anymore. I need one taste. Just enough to satisfy me for the rest of my life. My head leans towards her, our mouths a hair’s breadth apart as she parts her juicy pink lips.