Page 2 of Joel (Guardians of the North #6)
JOEL
“Do you want a granola bar?” I ask the woman in a form-fitted dry suit strapped into a seat along the back of the Jayhawk as we head back to base. Long, wavy blonde hair drapes over both shoulders—hair she let loose once she was helped out of the rescue basket and into the helicopter.
An image flashes in my mind of that same hair covering my thighs as she sucks on my cock.
Whoa! Not the fucking time, Joel .
Where the fuck did that come from?
“It’s apple cinnamon,” I add about the granola bar. “Made locally. It’s good stuff.”
I pretend not to notice the several sets of eyes that turn in my direction.
Fucking headsets. If I want a private conversation with the woman who’s name I still don’t know, I’ll have to wait until the crew can’t eavesdrop.
No way in hell they’ll let me live it down if I ask her now. They’ll make something of it for sure.
I’m the last of the six J-Squad members who’s single. It’s not even the guys I’m worried about taking shit from—it’s their wives who’ve been obsessed with helping me find my soulmate for the past year.
I know they mean well, but it’s over the top.
A year ago, I felt ready to settle down.
That was before The Wives appointed themselves my personal matchmaker.
If I have to go on one more blind date with some nice tourist woman they met at The Iceberg or while standing in line at Rocco’s Tacos —I don’t care how reformed that food truck is.
I refuse to get within a hundred yards of wherever it’s parked—I’m going to fucking lose it.
They think I want a nice girl .
“Oh, yes! I’m starving,” the blonde says.
She happily accepts my offering, flashing those amber eyes at me in appreciation.
My heart trips up, and my dick twitches.
Again . Not the fucking time . But damn, those eyes are potent.
Since I’ve already had one explicit vision, it’s not hard to imagine those honey-colored orbs looking up at me as she kneels between my legs, taking my cock into her mouth with enthusiasm.
Everything about this woman I’ve known less than twenty minutes promises she’d be fatal to my heart should I let her near it.
“You must be pretty special,” Jonas pipes up over the shared comms, his focus on her.
“Me?” she asks, her tone sounding innocent enough. But I’d bet my very robust savings that this curvy beauty is anything but innocent.
She didn’t seem as though she was in all that much distress when we found her on a routine training mission, floating in the middle of the sea in a life raft. She was kicked back, arms propped atop the inflated edge of the yellow raft, legs crossed. The only thing missing was the drink her hand.
That, and her boat.
“He doesn’t share his snacks with anyone,” Jasper Steele says from the cockpit, answering because I forgot my fucking words.
“Really?” she asks again, a mischievous twinkle in her eyes as her gaze meets mine again.
At least she’s finding this amusing. Me?
I’m tempted to toss my crew out the helicopter one by one.
Lucky for them, I don’t feel like diving into the water for a second time today.
The only place I’m interested in diving right now is right into that delicious pussy.
Fuck man. You need to get your ass home and jerk off in the shower. You’re not fit to be in public.
“Most of us would sooner fight off a grizzly than try to take one of Petty Officer Pierson’s precious snacks,” James Devano, the second pilot flying on this training mission today, says. “He gets hangry if he doesn’t eat.”
She breaks off a piece of the granola bar and hands it back to me. “You saved my life. I can’t let you get hangry on my account,” she teases.
I consider refusing the offer, but the piece she broke off has touched those pillowy lips. And dammit if those amber eyes aren’t stirring something deep within me as she watches the debate between us.
The chances that she’s a local are minimal—I’d remember those fucking eyes.
She’s likely a tourist passing through North Haven.
I can’t decide if that’s a good or a bad thing. But it gives me something else to focus on besides my primal urge to claim her for my own.
Whether or not she’s from Alaska doesn’t explain why she was on the water all alone.
Or where her boat is now.
The questions plague me, and I almost ask one. But after a glance at the peanut gallery around me, I stuff the bite of granola bar into my mouth instead.
Jonas raises an eyebrow, but I ignore him.
Despite my certainty that I did not find my soulmate floating around in the Bering Sea just waiting for me to rescue her, there’s something about this mysterious beauty dressed in a teal and purple dry suit that I can’t shake.
When I first locked eyes with her in the water, it felt as though my heart stopped beating.
Yeah, I’m taking that secret to my fucking grave.
It’s just lust. A whole lot of fucking lust .
We return to base a few minutes later, and I help her out of the helicopter.
She flashes me a sultry smile as she accepts my hand.
It doesn’t matter that I’m wearing gloves.
There’s a spark that starts at the connection of our joined hands, and it shoots straight to my fucking cock.
God, I feel like some barbaric, possessive caveman who wants to toss her over my shoulder and carry her back to my bed.
“You can let go now,” she says, her voice barely audible above the quieting Jayhawk engine. She glances down at our hands, and I yank mine free.
“Ma’am, we’ll need you to come inside for a few minutes,” James says. “We have to fill out an incident report.”
“Oh.” She says, the smile fading from not just her lips, but her eyes as well. “Right.” She shoulders a tote-sized bag that likely kept her valuables dry and follows James inside.
I hang back so I don’t make an even bigger ass of myself than I already have.
Am I attracted to the curvy beauty? Of course the fuck I am.
I’m only a man, and that woman is all delicious curves and intriguing mystery I’d love nothing more than to explore one inch at a time.
But sexual attraction is a far cry from true love.
At least that’s the logic I’m clinging to.
Jonas laughs beside me as we walk to the hanger.
“What?” I snap.
He claps me hard on the shoulder. “You’re so fucked.”