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“You, too.” She whispered.

Yeah? He had no idea what she wanted. “Me too, what?” Whatever it was she wanted, he was going to give it to her.

Felicity curled her fingers around the bottom of his own tee and pulled up. “Take this off.”

Shit yeah . The tee was off and flung to the corner of the room in an instant and Metal moved forward to kiss her. God, the feel of her naked breasts against his chest was just heaven. He was careful not to put weight on her, especially not on the wound. But he could rub against her, feel all that heat and softness right against his skin.

Felicity was naked under the covers that bunched around her waist. He was really glad he still had his jeans on because shit, he wouldn’t be able to resist climbing on her top of her otherwise. Her pale slender naked torso stopped where his blue comforter started and that was good.

Think of her as a mermaid, he thought. Sexless from the waist down. Hard to do when what he could see was so sexy she glowed.

Except of course for the bandaged side, which kept him just this side of red hot. Because he knew that his weight would be heavy for her, certainly uncomfortable, maybe even painful and he didn’t want the tiniest shred of pain with them in this bed.

It had been bad enough two nights ago when she had fallen through Lauren’s door. This beautiful young woman some fuckhead had slashed .

Now that he knew her, now that he’d kissed her, now that he felt a tug as strong as the tides toward her, he wanted to kiss her, pamper her and he could do that.

He just couldn’t fuck her.

Not yet, anyway.

Metal pulled a little away, reached out with his forefinger and traced a straight line down the center of her body, from her chin to her belly button. Tracing a line over that soft pale skin that felt like a little slice of paradise.

His gaze followed his finger down, then he placed his palm over the center of her chest, right between her soft breasts. He met her eyes. “You’re so beautiful.” The words were the right ones, exactly what a guy should say to a beautiful woman. But he got the rhythm and the tone wrong. His voice was rough, hoarse. Instead of a compliment it sounded like a painful confession.

She blushed. Without his tee on her, he saw that her blush extended all the way down to her breasts. The tops of them turned rosy too. Her breasts were already perfect but they became even more of a magnet now that they were pink.

His mouth watered. He wanted to kiss her breasts, lick and tug her nipples until they turned even harder. He felt like he could taste her already.

But something in her expression…

“I can’t be the first guy to tell you you’re beautiful.” He refused to believe that. Men were assholes but any man with gonads would be attracted to Felicity. He bent to give her a quick kiss. “Felicity?”

“No, of course not.” She blushed even more fiercely. “It’s just that?—”

“What?”

“Um, I guess the guys I’ve…dated, they aren’t big on compliments. And I think they were more impressed with my IT skills and video game scores than with my looks.”

Metal kept a straight face. “I’m impressed by your IT skills and game scores too. Does that give me points?”

She laughed. “Totally.”

“So can I do this?” He bent down, licked her right nipple and saw her shudder. In a good way. He lifted his head and stared down at her. “You okay with that?”

“Oh yeah.” She was bright pink, flushed and flustered and absolutely irresistible. He’d lied. He was impressed that she was so smart and he was sure she was good at video games but right now? Right now none of that made any difference to him. What was turning him on was the way she looked at him, huge blue eyes fixed on him. How she reacted to his every touch, how she moved into his touch. “Again,” she said breathlessly.

Hell yeah.

Metal bent again and this time he took her nipple fully in his mouth, holding her sides between his hands. Like holding an ice cream cone that was salty sweet. He pulled with his mouth, like a child only not, and she reacted strongly. She shuddered and he saw goosebumps rise along her forearms.

Good. He wasn’t alone in this. Because he was about as turned on as he’d ever been in his life. As a matter of fact he needed a new word for what what he felt. Turned on sounded bland. You got turned on by a song or a new gun. This was unexplored territory and it needed a new word. He’d think of one later. Right now he had trouble remembering his own name.

He bent to kiss her again, short nips, lifting and readjusting his mouth over hers. He was almost scared of a proper kiss—long, with lots of tongue. Entering her mouth his with tongue was scarily close to entering her with his dick and that wasn’t something he could do. Yet.

The thought of that, the thought of finally entering her whenever it could happen, caused him to jerk a little. She pulled back in surprise.

He was trying to think of something that would explain why he jerked without making him sound like a moron— sorry about that, I flashed on fucking you and my system went haywire —didn’t cut it.

Then he couldn’t think of anything at all because she did what he’d done. She placed her palm flat on his chest. They both looked down. Her hand was slender, long-fingered like the hand of a musician’s. Ivory skin against his tanned chest. The contrast between her hand and his chest was amazingly erotic.

Metal usually thought that erotic things had to be connected to fucking. Man, he was so wrong. Just looking at her was erotic. Yeah, she was naked, but he’d wanted her just as fiercely when she’d been covered up by his tee. Everything about her was erotic, turned him on enormously. Her coloring—sunny blonde hair, sky blue eyes, ivory skin. Her shape—slender but totally female, a tiny waist between breasts that were perfect for his hands and hips made to be gripped.

She was so enticing. Not jumping her right now, not sliding into her, was costing him years off his life.

Felicity patted him then her fingers curled into his muscle. She had short fingernails but even if she had those claws some women had she wouldn’t hurt him.

“You feel wonderful,” she said. Her gaze switched from his chest to his eyes and back. When she moved her eyes it was like lightning flashing. He was mesmerized.

Her lashes were light brown tipped with gold and he couldn’t tear his gaze away from her as she looked up and back down again, the thick gold tipped lashes like little fans. Her eyebrows, too, were fascinating, gold and ashbrown hairs, the gold glinting in the dim light. And her hair. God. No woman should have hair like that. Purely her own color, too. There were a thousand colors in there, though mainly gold. Tiny almost invisible pale gold hairs fluffed around her face. If any hairdresser could replicate that color, he’d be rich.

“What?” she said, as he continued scrutinizing her.

“You’re so beautiful you melt my eyeballs. Everything about you is so perfect.”

She shook her head, smiling. “I’ve got defects.”

“Name one.”

“A mole right above my left buttock.”

A mole right above her left buttock. He closed his eyes, imagining it. Oh God. His dick wanted to punch its way out of his jeans.

“I can’t cook,” she warned. “I mainly eat takeout and frozen pizza.”

“That’s okay. I cook.” Metal was touching her breasts, rubbing his thumb over the smooth satiny skin. He didn’t give a fuck about takeout and frozen pizza.

She was doing the same to him, feeling his pecs. When she scraped a fingernail over a nipple it shot straight to his dick. He made a strangled sound deep in his throat.

“You feel so very good,” she sighed. “Just amazing.”

He saw her mouth move but couldn’t make out the words because his head was about to explode. “What?”

Her eyes were half closed. The skin was so fine he could see tiny blue veins in her eye lids. “You. Feel. Good.”

“God. Can barely understand English.” Now the words penetrated. “See what you reduce me to?”

She blinked blankly, not having made the connection of him unable to understand words and her own allure. He placed his hand over hers and man, double whammy. Her palm over his chest, his palm over her hand.

He really was going to stroke out when they had sex if this tiny amount of stimulation got him going like this.

Gently, he eased her down in the bed until she was lying flat on her back. Her breasts were so soft. The last woman he’d had sex with had had breasts that looked like basketballs perched on her chest when she was lying on her back. That was when he’d sworn off implants.

Had been some time ago, too.

Months, in fact, come to think of it. Was that why he was so worked up? Because it was a long time since the last time he’d had sex?

Nah.

He hadn’t had been having sex because he’d sort of lost interest in it. He was interested now. Oh man, was he interested. A bomb could go off in the next room and he’d still be staring at Felicity’s breasts.

He bent his head and kissed her there, where his hand had been. There was nothing in him that could resist the idea of his mouth on her breasts. He nibbled his way around her left breast, relishing the hard beat of her heart under his lips.

She was alive and well and that was a miracle. She could have died the other day. The fucker could have slashed an artery and she would have bled out there alone on the airport concours and he would never have known her. Never held this miracle woman in his arms.

“Metal?” She’d clued into his sudden change, probably to the air molecules shifting around him. Because all of a sudden he needed to claim her, claim this woman he’d almost lost before knowing her.

He looked up at the slightly breathless tone. Did he hear a touch of fear?

No way. No way was he going to hurt her.

“Not going to hurt you,” he said in a guttural tone. “But I gotta do this.”

As a declaration of intent it wasn’t much but somehow it reassured her. Her head had lifted a little from the pillow to look at him, but now she plopped her head back.

He consciously made his hands gentle. When the image of a dead Felicity lying in a pool of her own blood coursed through him he’d stopped himself just in time from gripping her hard.

His hands were strong and if he gripped her hard he’d hurt her. Nope. Not going to happen. So he opened his hands and used only his outstretched palms to touch her, running them over her breasts, down her narrow torso, down over her smooth flat belly.

Down.

Before he had to ask, her legs slid apart. Oh yeah. Smart Felicity.

Metal threw back the covers and feasted his eyes. Had he ever seen a woman more gorgeous than this?

Back in the Sandbox, porn magazines had been everywhere. Sex and alcohol had always been the stress relievers for soldiers. Alcohol was out because it was a dry country. They doled out maybe one miserable bottle of beer a day, if that. The supplies were kept under lock and key.

Sex—well there were women on base though not out on missions. But the women on base were mostly officers and untouchable. And, well, for him at least, a fellow soldier just didn’t inspire sex. Loyalty and respect yes, but sex? After about a month the women were just as sexless as the men. Covered in dust and sand, eating bad food, shitting infrequently because they were so gummed up from the crap food and smelling kinda ripe because the showers were clogged up and disgusting, even for the guys.

No one ever showered barefoot because you could pick up nasty funguses and yeah, everyone stank.

So no sex and the guys just looked at porn magazines. God knows what the women did. But for a couple of years, the barracks were awash in pictures of naked women with tiny hips and humongous boobs and pouty lips and empty eyes. Caricatures of women. He wouldn’t have been surprised if they were CGI.

Jesus, this woman was so different she could have been another species.

Soft yet strong. Escaping a killer twice while wounded—well not many soldiers could have managed that. Razor sharp. Amazingly beautiful, and the real deal too.

She had no makeup on and she didn’t need it. Her coloring was incredibly rich with those sky blue eyes, golden hair and eyebrows and eyelashes, deep pink mouth. Ivory skin with a rose undertone.

Amazing.

Between her legs was an ash brown cloud tipped with gold and further down gleaming pink lips. She was so beautiful here, too.

Carefully watching her eyes, he slid his fingers over her, sliding in gently. Full lips blew out a breath and her eyes narrowed so that only a slit of bright blue showed. She felt like wet silk. He penetrated her with his finger, watching her carefully. He didn’t have to look at her to see how aroused she was, he could feel it against his hand. She was hot, wet, her body weeping for him.

His was weeping for her, too. If his dick hadn’t been encased in briefs and jeans it would have been wet with pre come. His balls were tight and his entire groin hurt. That was ok. He could deal with pain. SEALs lived with pain. They marched to the cadence of ‘pain is weakness leaving the body’.

Luckily, Felicity wasn’t in any pain. No, she looked relaxed, pleasured.

He slid his finger out then in again, exactly what he’d like to be doing with his dick. She sighed and he nearly sighed too. God, just this was better than sex with any other woman.

“Like that?” he asked hoarsely.

“Hm.”

“Say it.” His voice was sharper than he intended. But he really needed her to say it out loud.

She should have slapped him down but she didn’t. Her lips curved in a dreamy smile and she watched out out of those brilliant semi-closed eyes. “I like that, Metal. A lot.”

“Say my name.”

“Metal.”

“My real name.” Jesus, why was he behaving like such an asshole?

“Okay. Sean then. I like what you’re doing to me, Sean.” No censure in her voice. And it slammed him upside the head that she understood, on a deep level, what he wanted. Metal was his military nickname and he was fine with it. Most of the people he dealt with on a daily basis were friends from his soldiering days anyway.

He was Metal. Metal was a soldier. But Sean—Sean was a man. Sean O’Brien of a family beyond his military family. He wanted to be Sean for her. Something more than a soldier.

And who better to recognize that he was two people than someone who’d been someone else all her life?

She did understand. She was smiling at him, caressing his skull trim.

“Sean,” she murmured.

Oh God. His heart gave a huge kick in his chest. Even with her eyes half closed, Felicity saw him better than anyone else ever had. She saw straight into him. And from the dreamy smile on her face she liked what she saw.

Against all the odds.

“I was going to go down on you but I really need to kiss your mouth instead,” he said roughly.

She blushed and it was such a beautiful thing to watch.

“Oh, um. Ok.”

Metal shifted so that his head was even with hers and kissed her, while keeping his fingers inside her, staking his claim.

The kiss was deep and he didn’t lift his head. They breathed through each other. His tongue stroked hers while his fingers stroked between her legs, in rhythm with his tongue. She was wet and warm in both places and felt like heaven.

Carefully, carefully he rolled a little on top of her. Just enough so that his mouth was right above hers as they kissed endlessly. His finger stroked in and out. He reached deep inside her and felt her gasp in his mouth.

“Like that?” he whispered without leaving her mouth.

“Oh yeah.” He could feel the exhalation of breath as she said the words.

His finger reached deeper into her softness. “And that?”

She made a noise deep in her throat. But he knew she liked it because she contracted around his finger and her hips lifted slightly. He stroked her inside, deep and slow. Her arms twined around his neck bringing him even closer to her.

Her thighs started trembling as he increased the rhythm of his stroking and her mouth went slack. The kiss deepened. He pressed her harder into the pillow as he stroked her faster and faster. Their mouths and his finger in her sex were making little noises in the quiet room. It was like a little symphony. Then her gasps were added and then another deep noise. It took him a second to realize it was him, growling in his throat as he felt her sex contract once, twice. When he bit her lips she exploded, hips rising and falling, clenching hard around his hand and oh God, he’d never felt anything as wonderful as that.

He held her tightly, kissing her through her orgasm until she subsided, a light sheen of sweat over her flushed body. The hold around his neck relaxed and her arms fell bonelessly to her sides. He lifted his head to look down at her, that beautiful face pure sex. Beard rash, mouth swollen and wet, a slight smile on her face.

She lifted a hand as if it weighed a ton and caressed his face. He was slightly bristly and needed a shave. He was going into the bathroom to jerk off and wash off but first he had to kiss her. Because it was impossible not to.

Her eyes half opened, like lifting a lid hiding the summer sky. The smile widened. “Wow.”

At any other time he’d be doing internal capers and smiling smugly because he’d gotten the woman off. But this felt different. Real and serious. Felicity’s face was so soft as she looked at him. That expression of intelligent wariness had disappeared. He’d heard her story, understood how she’d lived a life undercover, which meant hiding emotions from the world.

Metal had never been sent in undercover. He was too big and fair for one thing. But it was also recognized that he didn’t have the mindset for it. He was a warrior and he went into battle in uniform. He never had to pretend to be what he was not.

Felicity, her whole childhood, never had that luxury. He recognized now how she hid behind a facade because that facade was…down. She was open to him. And he was open to her.

They were touching only via her hand on his face and it was like his molecules were melding with hers. It was such an intense feeling it was almost unsettling. He opened his mouth, closed it, then thought what the hell. “At the risk of sounding stupid, I never felt anything like that before.”

That was exactly the kind of statement dumb guys made just before opening themselves up to being slashed open by a sharp tongue.

She shook her head. “Me either. That was amazing.”

Metal nodded. “And it wasn’t even sex.”

She made a choked sound, like a laugh and a cough at the same time. “Well, it sure felt like sex.”

“It was sort of sex.” His eyes circled her face. “But we’ll be having the real thing. Soon.”

Another choked sound. “Yeah.”

“As soon as your bandages are off and stitches out.”

“What bandages? What stitches?”

This time he made the choked laugh sound. He touched the tip of his forefinger to her nose. “Okay. So I’m going to the bathroom for a shower and a shave.” And to jerk off. “And then I’ll help you wash. No shower for you yet, but soon. And then we go into ASI.”

“ASI?”

“My company. Jacko’s company. We’ve put in a request to have the airport footage and it might be arriving soon.”

She used her elbows and sat up against the pillows. “You put in a request?” she echoed blankly. “For the footage?”

“Yeah. We’ll see if we can get a visual on the guy and then?—”

Felicity shook her head, amused. “You didn’t need to put in a request. I could get that footage for you in three minutes, Sean. Tops. I didn’t do it sooner because I didn’t think about it. I felt really awful and weak and I wasn’t thinking straight. But now I feel much better and I can get the footage from the airport from here. By the time you get out of the shower in fact.”

Metal didn’t even try to argue with her. He knew his hackers and the distinction between legally and illegally obtaining data wasn’t one they easily grasped. He used the only argument he could. “We’re going to involve the Portland PD and if we catch the fucker there’s going to be a trial and he’s going to be put behind bars for a long long time. To do that we need to observe legal niceties otherwise any evidence will be thrown out long before we get to trial. So thanks for the thought but we’ll do this the official way.”

“Okay. But I’ll get that footage for you anyway so that we can start work on it. And then when the ‘official’ footage comes we’ll be ahead of the game. Hospital footage too.”

Metal nodded. He had no trouble whatsoever with getting the jump on the authorities. If they caught the guy they’d just catch him again on the footage provided by the airport. Which was still pissed at the fake bomb alert. He knew John had to tiptoe around that one. If the airport authorities figured out that Felicity was the one to pull the alarm she’d be in trouble. Even if she’d saved her own life.

Metal was not about to let that happen.

He bent down to kiss her and went to the bathroom for a shower and a shave and a little relief.

Metal—Sean—came out from the bathroom barechested, shaved, in clean jeans and smelling of soap. Had he shampooed? He had a skull trim and Felicity had no idea how those worked. Certainly he didn’t need to blow dry his hair.

He smiled at her and walked across the room, keeping his eyes on her the whole time, and oh my. She’d been lying in a puddle of pleasure, completely wiped out. But the sight of all that beefcake—tons of ripped muscles moving in perfect harmony as an alpha male moved straight to what it wanted—woke her tired body up and infused it with newfound energy.

Because what this alpha male wanted was her.

Where two seconds before she’d been a formless mass of sweat-soaked bliss all her muscles tightened as strode toward her. Her most reliable ally, her brain, had gone AWOL and all that was left was hormones and erogenous zones. Breasts, sex, mouth, belly…every inch of her that he’d kissed and touched roared to life.

He couldn’t possibly think she was ready for a second round did he? Because she wasn’t. Absolutely not. Well maybe , she thought as she watched all those muscles moving…if he asked nicely.

He stopped by the bedside and looked down at her. She must be quite a sight. Hair spread out all over the pillow, lips swollen. Completely naked.

He held out an enormous hand. “Come on honey. You’ll feel better after washing and putting on clean clothes.”

Feel better ? This was one of the top ten moments of her life.

He lifted her out of the bed and she stood awkwardly, very aware of her nudity. Covering her breasts and sex with an arm and a hand would be really stupid but she had to practically order her arms to stay down. She wasn’t used to nudity in front of other people. Her few sexual encounters had been firmly under the covers and she’d gotten dressed the instant she was out of the bed. This embarrassment was really dumb and she had to get over it.

She stared at the ground and there were his bare feet. His feet were absolutely fascinating. Very long but narrow and with high arches. Tendons and raised veins running over the top of the feet, a few blond hairs on the straight toes. They could have been the feet of a Greek marble statue only flesh-toned.

Sex had broken what little filter she had between brain and mouth. Head still down, she opened her mouth and “You have beautiful feet” came out.

And she blushed.

His head was down too. “You have beautiful feet too. Prettier than mine, that’s for sure.” He stepped forward and placed his big feet outside her much smaller feet. She had on pale pink toe polish. It was an interesting contrast.

“I have prettier nail polish, too,” she mused.

He lifted his big foot, examined it. “Yep.”

They both laughed, lifted their heads. Their eyes met and her awkwardness was gone, just like that.

He tugged at her hand. “Let’s get you washed and dressed.”

Before, it had sounded so outlandish. She’d been washing and dressing herself forever. She didn’t need help. Helping her get washed and dressed made her sound like a child. And even as a child she’d been self sufficient for as long as she could remember. Her mother had never helped her get dressed and ready for school, she’d always done it herself.

But Metal made it not awkward and infantalising. And to her surprise, she did need help. She could probably have done it all herself but it was have taken forever and it would have been painful. With Metal’s help, it went smoothly and painlessly.

She stood like a doll as he smoothed a washcloth over her. When the washcloth cleaned her between her legs, a wave of heat pulsed through her, so strong she forgot to be embarrassed.

But beyond that, it was a gesture of caring. He’d fed her, loved her senseless and now was washing her and it was almost more intimate than the non-sex sex they’d had on the bed. Strangers can have sex without feelings. But you can’t gently wash someone without emotions being there. Sex was one thing. That level of caring was another.

She bent down curiously to watch as he gently peeled away the bandage. What had been a terrible slash was now a thin line with tiny black stitches. “Doesn’t look so bad,” she said.

Metal was very carefully washing it with an antiseptic solution and applying an antibiotic cream. “No, you’re healing really well.”

She met his eyes. “I had really good care.”

He nodded. “That you did.”

“About the clinic,” she said and Sean tensed. “I don’t remember the whole thing very clearly but I got the impression that it was an…unorthodox clinic. Am I right?”

“Hm,” he said, body language wary.

“Well, I’m all for unorthodox particularly when it’s in a good cause. Do you think that later I could make a donation? I accepted a contract from a company that is keeping the Midwest fat. Do you think your doctor friend would mind if I donated the proceeds of that contract to the clinic? I’d be grateful and it would make me feel a whole lot better.”

Sean relaxed. He applied fresh sterile gauze and was taping the edges. This strip of gauze was much smaller and she didn’t feel like The Mummy so much anymore.

“I think he’d really appreciate that. As a matter of fact?—”

His cell, which he kept with him at all times and was on the bathroom counter, played the refrain of Don’t Stop Believing. “That’s HQ. They are probably calling us in.”

Yes. Good timing, too. Felicity felt worlds away from the wounded woman who’d stumbled into Lauren’s home, bleeding and exhausted. The wound was healing quickly. It didn’t hurt at all. She was rested, had eaten well. Better, actually, than when she was at home.

Just surviving had taken all her strength but now? Now she was ready to fight back. Go on the offensive. Darin DNA was courageous DNA. Her father had managed to escape from a totalitarian government. She was not going to play the victim.

She wasn’t a warrior like Sean. But she was smart.

“Yes,” she said. “Take the call and let’s go.”