He mumbled again—words that might have been, “Big-ass couch. Share.”
“Share? Not a chance, partner. I’m not even sure you know the meaning of the word.”
“Mmm.”
It was a big-ass couch, but she didn’t intend to share it with him. Especially not when she found something strangely appealing about big, cocky Marcus Swain crashed out on the cushions, all sleepy and slurry. That got her on her feet. E
specially, especially not when she should be kicking his ass for acing her out of the action tonight. Although—she looked down at him—all things considered, maybe she’d been the lucky one. Sacrificing her pillow to the cause, she eased it under his head, then took another moment to slide his boots off his feet and put them under the end table.
“’Night, Swain,” she whispered as she clicked the table lamp off.
A soft snore served as his reply.
Conscience clear on taking an unscheduled night in the bed, she retreated to the bedroom, fully prepared to snooze like a baby on the one item of furniture in the house actually designed for sleep. Consequently, it came as a shock, hours later, when something pitched her out of a dream. Sitting up, staring around the dark bedroom, she listened. Her phone sat on the nightstand. A tap of her finger, and the screen read two thirty. The house sounded quiet as a tomb, but something—
A low moan carried from the living room.
Swain?
She crept out of bed, went toward the door, and halted as he moaned again. This time, it took the shape of a word. “Stop.”
Shit. Shit. Was someone in the house? As quickly as possible, she retreated to the closet and searched for the metal lockbox stowed on the top shelf. Another, louder moan came from the living room. “Can’t…”
Every instinct inside her urged her to hurry. Her hands shook as she entered the combination but steadied as she pulled out her 9 mm. The weight of it calmed her. Focused her. Quietly, quietly, she inserted a magazine, flicked off the safety, and edged her way into the hall.
Swain moaned from the other room. She hugged the wall, moving fast, blinking to adjust her eyes to the dark. She feinted around the corner, gun aimed at the couch, and froze. Swain lay there, alone, tossing restlessly as if in a fight with an invisible assailant. Moonlight filtering through the window gleamed like silver on his skin. Lots of skin. Sometime during the night, he’d shed his T-shirt and jeans. He’d shed…everything.
“Can’t breathe. Jesus. Fuckers.”
“Swain.” She said his name loudly as she approached the couch. “Swain,” she repeated and touched his shoulder.
He threw an arm wide, knocking her gun out of her hand. It hit the floor with a thud, and she endured a sickening nightmare of it discharging, shooting one or both of them, so they bled out in the dark. “Swain!”
This time, she bent over him and shook him by both shoulders. He bolted upright with the gasp of a man deprived of breath for too long and headbutted her. While stars exploded in front of her eyes, big fists grabbed her wrists in a crushing grip. The world spun out of orbit, and then she landed on her back on the sofa. Two hundred pounds of etched muscles and trembling fury held her down.
“It’s Eden. Marc.” She pried her eyes open, and his shadowed face swam into focus. His eyes glinted in the watery moonlight, open but not really seeing. Adrenaline shook his frame. “It’s Eden,” she said again. “You had a dream. A bad dream.”
One blink. Two. His body stilled.
“Eden?”
Chapter Twelve
The dream faded—dream, memory, a toxic combination of both—as Eden’s voice called him out of the claustrophobic horror of a hood over his head, a thick arm around his windpipe, and a rain of fists and boots doing their best to break every bone in his body. He blinked down at her in the darkness. Her eyes shone, huge and full of concern. Her full lips parted. “Marc?”
Fuuuuuck.
“Jesus. Sorry.” He released her wrists. “I just… I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.” She reached up and brushed his forehead with cool, featherlight fingertips. “You’re okay.”
And just like that, every nerve ending in his body snapped to attention, sending input to his brain in fast bursts—her long, bare legs tangled with his, her cotton-covered breasts crushed and heaving under his chest. His painfully urgent hard-on pressed along her smooth thigh. He groaned again, but this time it had nothing to do with the dream. Well, only peripherally.
Maybe she misunderstood, though, because she cupped his cheek and repeated, “You’re okay.”
He wasn’t. He was a fucked-up mess with a fucked-up past he still couldn’t quite outrun after all these years, but being near to her, like this, felt dangerously close to salvation. Salvation he was desperate for. Desperate to obliterate the vision of himself in the clutches of a dream from his mind, and from her mind, and replace fear and pity with a frenzy of pleasure.
Dragged along by that impulse, he kissed her. Not a soft, slow kiss of appreciation, but an urgent, slightly brutal rush to feast on all her softness. To lose himself in her. Or find himself. In that moment, the outcome didn’t matter. Only the now mattered—the heat, the rush, the escape. Her mouth moved under his, plush lips parting, offering, and it was all the invitation he needed. He took and took in fast, greedy sweeps and devastating plunges. Pleading little sounds came from her throat—possibly telling him he was being too rough—but her hands bracketed his head, holding him close.