Page 15 of Sawyer (The Maddox BRAVO Team #1)

Camille

I replay the cellar feed so many times the image blurs—Sawyer, tux jacket shed, gloves on, kneeling before a silver bomb ticking down our destruction.

He doesn’t flinch when the timer clicks below thirty.

He merely breathes, steady and sure, hands moving with lethal grace.

One clip, one twist, and the second hand stops.

A war fought in murmurs and micro-movements. A war he wins for me.

The recording ends. My lungs ache as if I’d held the bomb myself.

All evening I greeted donors and thanked dignitaries, but my mind remained six feet underground, ticking toward ruin with him.

Sexy—and terrifying—that the man who guarded my brushstrokes could disarm death while still smelling faintly of gun oil and midnight rain.

A soft knock draws me from the monitor glow. My bedroom door creaks open, and Sawyer steps in, hair damp from a quick shower, black t-shirt untucked. Moonlight frames him like a storm given shape. I rise from the desk before thought can intervene.

“Bomb squad’s hauled the device,” he says, voice low. “Guests will never know.”

I swallow the fist of fear clawing my throat. “You could’ve died.”

“Could have,” he agrees, crossing to me. “Didn’t.”

His calm frays my composure. I rush forward, fists balling in his shirt. “What if you hadn’t? One wrong wire—” My voice cracks. “I can’t lose you.”

He folds me against his chest, chin resting atop my head. His heartbeat—steady even now—echoes through my ribs. “Not planning on going anywhere.”

I lean back, and search his eyes. “Stay tonight. Please.”

He brushes a curl from my cheek. “I’ll always say yes to you.” The promise vibrates deeper than a vow.

Heat blooms. I tip my face, capturing his mouth.

The kiss is hungry. Indecent. It’s no polite brush, but more like a claiming.

He answers in kind, hands sliding down my spine, gathering the satin of my gown until my body molds to the hard planes of his.

I gasp as his tongue coaxes mine, teasing and tasting.

“Cam,” he rasps against my lips, “tell me to stop if?—”

“Don’t you dare,” I breathe, threading my fingers through his hair. I tug lightly, and a groan rumbles in his chest, thrilling me. His palms splay over my hips, drawing me closer, until not even air fits between us.

We stumble toward the bed, mouths never parting. He sits first, pulling me astride his lap. The split of my gown pools around us like sapphire waves. I cradle his jaw, kissing him slow and deep. He answers with reverence, as though mapping every contour to memory.

His hands glide up my back, finding the hidden zipper. He hesitates—granting me the choice. I whisper “yes,” and the gown loosens, sliding off one shoulder. His lips follow the path, pressing fire along my exposed skin. I arch, my fingers digging into his shoulders.

When he lifts his head, pupils blown, breath ragged, I see battlefields and sunsets and every line he’s drawn finally erased. He cups my face. “You are color and oxygen.”

“And you’re my shield,” I whisper, kissing the corner of his smile.

I guide him down onto the pillows as the moonlight strokes the angles of his face.

Our mouths meet again—slow, then faster, matching the gallop of our heartbeats.

His hands roam with aching care, as if memorizing sacred art.

I let the gown fall completely, baring silk and skin, and his breath hitches—a sound of wonder that steals mine.

We tumble sideways, laughter catching on our mouths, kisses turning greedy and then soft, urgent and tender in the same breath.

The sheets caress my shoulder blades; his chest is heat and cedar, the steady drum of his heart against mine.

When his fingertips skim the curve of my thigh, a shiver sparks low and bright—I arch into his touch, shameless, silently asking for more.

He pauses, searching my face like he’s reading a map he already knows by heart. I hold his gaze and let yes flood every inch of me—chin tipped up, breath trembling, hand guiding his wrist higher. Consent isn’t a word; it’s a pulse thudding in my throat, in the press of my palm over his.

The last sliver of restraint slips. “I need you with every cell of my body,” he rasps, voice rough velvet.

“I feel exactly the same,” I whisper, and it’s the truest thing I’ve ever said.

His mouth crooks into a sinful smirk as his fingers find fabric and peel it away.

Mine are just as greedy—buttons, buckles, the warm give of his skin under my hands.

Clothes scatter with little gasps and clinks, and suddenly there is only heat and the delicious shock of bare everywhere.

We pause—just five reverent seconds—stretched out, drinking each other in like a masterpiece revealed.

God. He is carved from light and shadow—clean lines, the slope of his shoulders, the tight plane of his abdomen, those strong thighs braced like promise.

He’s a study in sculpted symmetry and barely leashed hunger, and the longer I stare the harder it is to remember how to breathe.

My mouth actually parts. My fingers trace down the path my eyes took, slow and worshipful, and he shudders under the touch, that wicked smile softening at the edges as if my awe is undoing him.

“Come here, Cam,” he murmurs.

I crawl over him, straddling his hips, palms splayed on that perfect chest, and lower myself over his thick hardness. My voice is a sigh against his lips. “Tell me when to stop.”

“Never,” he says, and I swallow the word with a kiss, tasting promise and heat as I roll my hips—showing him exactly how ready I am, how completely I want him.

The room blurs; the world tilts to just us; and the only rhythm I know is the pant of his breath and the way he melts when I touch him like he’s the only work of art I’ll ever want to make.

“You’re perfect,” I whisper to him, running my nails over the broad muscles of his chest, my body riding him up and down, over and over again.

“That’s it, Cam, fuck …”

The rough, low gravel of his voice—need braided into every syllable—lights me up; heat surges through me and my hips quicken on instinct, rocking harder to match the hunger he breathes into the dim room.

He grips my hips, moving north toward my breasts as he pitches forward, his mouth covering my nipple. He repositions us, to where I’m flat on my back, him on top of me. He enters me in one quick thrust, both of us stilling once he’s all the way inside.

“Fuck, Cam… you feel so fucking good.” His need is thick in his voice.

I gaze into his gray eyes, the color mesmerizing me. “Please don’t ever stop.”

He smoothes a hand over my hair, his eyes locking onto mine as he thrusts his hips forward. “ Never .”

Heat unfurls under my sternum, spreading outward in slow, pulsing waves at the way he holds me—hands firm at my hips, touch sure and reverent, like he’s staking a claim he intends to keep.

His breath ghosts my ear, our rhythm syncing until the room blurs and all I feel is the steady insistence of us.

It’s intoxicating, this sense that he’s nowhere else and never will be, that we’re suspended in a pocket of time made just for two.

I don’t want the moment to thin or spill; I want to stretch it wide, memorize every breath and shiver, and live right here where his touch says stay .

I would press a pin in this second and keep it forever.

He keeps moving inside me, slow and unhurried at first, and then his tempo picks up. He presses his forehead against mine, and our breaths become mingled together as things escalate.

“Take all of me. I’m yours,” he whispers into my mouth and I spread my legs even farther, letting him slip deeper inside me. “Are you on the pill?”

I smirk. “Kind of late for the birth control talk, isn’t it?”

He growls. “Cam, tell me.”

I gaze into his eyes, memorizing him. “Yes, I’m on the pill.” My body builds closer to that pivotal moment. Toward the release we’re both chasing. “I’m so close.” I grip onto him tighter.

He bucks away on top of me, his body solid and … perfect . “Come all over me, Cam. I’ve got you.” And I believe him.

This man has had me since day one. Since I first laid eyes on him. He’s had me. Hook, line, and sinker.

“Don’t ever let go,” I tell him, my body so dang close. “ Sawyer ,” I say his name like a prayer as my body detonates. “Ah, Sawyer,” I shout and his grip on me tightens.

“Give it to me, Cam. I've got you.”

I don’t stop. My body doesn’t slow down as a tsunami of emotions slam into my chest all at once. “Sawyer,” now his name comes out as a curse. “Fuck me,” I whisper as my body starts the downward slope.

He takes my words as an invitation to let loose. He bucks and fucks. He thrusts into me harder than before. He uses me as he seeks out his own release. And I enjoy every second of it. “You’re fucking gorgeous,” he says between pumps of his dick. “So fucking pretty.”

I soak in his praise like heat after a winter plunge, each honeyed word pouring over me until my skin prickles and my muscles go loose and heavy.

The warmth spreads from my chest to my fingers and toes, a slow, sweet tide that leaves me boneless and bright, even as my lungs still chase breath.

I’m wrung out and trembling, yet every nerve is lit—vibrating with the echo of his voice, the thrum of my pulse, the lingering spark of every place his hands have been.

And then he kisses me. A full, soul-searing kiss that owns me in every sense of the word.

His body stills slightly as his release hits him.

He grips tight…then lets loose. Each pump of his hips slams into me, his dick pulsing as his release floods inside me.

“You’re everything,” he whispers. “ Every-fucking-thing .”