Second Chance with His Army Doc

In a short while the low-flying Hercules C130 would fly by, dropping three seven-hundred-and-fifty-kilogram pallet-loads of supplies by parachute. From saline drips to MRI scanners, and from stretchers to generators.

It was up to her team to retrieve the pallets, load them onto the back of an army lorry and get them back to the location they had identified for a field hospital. Then set them up for a strata one medical facility comprising an eighteen-by-twenty-four tent for one resuscitation bay, one field surgical table and one ITU bed.

The ultimate test was that the first ‘test’ casualties would be arriving one hour from ‘drop-off’ and the field hospital would have to be up and running by then. A hectic but well-organised and practised set-up that would entail full attention from the moment the pallets were parachuted in. And Mattie welcomed it.

Anything to keep her mind from wandering back to the weekend. That perfect night when it had just been Kane and herself. Even now, two days later and thousands of miles away, her body still ached deliciously. Muscles she had forgotten about reminded her of the way they had made love, over and over. Relearning each other, their shape, their feel, their taste.

They had taken their time, relearning what the other liked. Even now, she could still hear those impossibly carnal groans as she’d tightened around him.

And then she thought about when she’d knelt down in front of him in the shower later that night, the hot water running over their bodies as she’d reacquainted herself with the taste of him, the way she’d done when they’d been teenagers.

Only this time she’d had a few tricks. It was odd because she hadn’t really enjoyed it with any other man. It had always felt like such a powerless, surrendering position to be in. But Kane had always been different, and she’d thrilled in those impossibly feral noises he’d made as she’d used her tongue like a weapon against him.

The way he’d stared down at her with such a black, lust-filled, carnal expression when she’d taken him into her mouth, and the way he’d reacted—like he was shaking from the inside out—when she’d grazed her teeth down his length. It had made her feel like the most powerful woman in the world to know that she was doing that to Kane, having that effect on him. She’d deliberately ignored all his warnings for her to stop until he’d been helpless to do anything but brace his hands on the wet tiles and let her have her way.

And then he’d carried her back to the bed and punished her with his all-too-clever hands and his all too wicked mouth. Taking her in every way possible, making her splinter apart so many times she’d thought she’d never be able t

o piece herself back together.

Or ever want to.

If there had been any way that she could have stayed with him in that hotel room forever—ignored her orders to fly out here—Mattie knew she would have done so. Willingly.

And she hated herself for it.

That night was supposed to have been about closure. Nothing more. It certainly hadn’t been about picking up where they’d left off fourteen years ago. It wasn’t as though he’d even tried to explain what had happened back then. And yet, whatever she’d tried telling herself in that nightclub about taking just one weekend to indulge in whatever that...thing was between her and Kane, she now feared that one weekend wasn’t enough.

Three months, Mattie told herself desperately. Three months to get her head in order a few thousand miles away from home on this prairies exercise where she couldn’t give in to this outrageous urge to call Kane.

And it would be all too easy to do.

His mobile number might be tucked safely in the jewellery box in her accommodation back in the UK—she hadn’t wanted the temptation of bringing it out with her, focus was key for this exercise—but she had memorised it on sight. Her thirsty brain soaking it up in an instant. As though a traitorous part of her had needed more. Had needed him. And this time that perfidious part wasn’t simply going to leave it alone or let her stuff it back in that deep, dark hole inside herself, like she’d done with it over a decade ago.

She was out here for a reason. To do a job. And she’d be damned if she didn’t do the best job that she possibly could.

Fighting to tune her brain back to the present, Mattie grasped at the first conversation she could hear going on around her.

‘So, we’re going to be dealing with IED cases?’ One of the newer members of the team was posing the question in general.

It was the distraction Mattie needed.

‘IEDs, yes.’ She stepped forward. ‘But also routine small arms fire, indirect fire, sprained ankles, musculoskeletal injuries. It’s a bit of confidence and morale for the front-line troops that medical support isn’t far away.’

‘Yes, ma’am.’ The young lance corporal nodded, and Mattie had to quash the urge to tell him to use her first name.

With the medical corps, consultants and surgeons working so closely alongside combat medical technicians, unlike the rest of the army they tended to have a more relaxed approach to rank in the field. But all that would be changing for her now that she was months away from promotion to Lieutenant-Colonel. Her new role would mean that she would be moving out of the field and more into training roles.

It was going to feel strange, but she was oddly excited. Or she had been until she’d started wondering how it would fit in with Kane. One thing they hadn’t done at the weekend had been discuss anything personal. As though neither of them had wanted the real world to encroach on their perfect bubble for fear that old prejudices would mar the moment.

‘We might even get some routine infectious diseases, which is why it’s always a fine balance knowing what equipment we might need and what we can reasonably carry, as well as how long we can reasonably sustain ourselves.’

‘Squeezing the most capability out of the least equipment?’

‘Exactly,’ Mattie agreed. ‘For Operation Strikethrough, it’s about testing the support network, but right now this part is for us to test our own teams, especially in the space available. This part of the exercise gives us the chance to iron out any potential problems so that when we’re doing the main battlegroup roles next month we know what works at our end so that we can really test them in their new tactical approach.’

‘Yes, ma’am,’ the young man agreed.

‘Major Brigham.’