“You already said that.” He reached for the pack, dragged it into the house, slammed the door, caught her by the shoulders and hoisted her to her toes. “What were you supposed to do if something happened to me?”
“Don’t you understand? I was afraid that—that you were hurt. Or dead. Or—”
“You were supposed to run. Get to the river. Get into the canoe. Get your ass out of here. What part of that couldn’t you remember?”
“And leave you,” she said in an unsteady whisper.
“Damn right!”
“Leave you to bleed. To die. Leave you, and never know what happened to you—”
He was furious. Hot with rage. A simple command, and she hadn’t followed it. A straightforward set of instructions, and she’d disobeyed them.
He wanted to shake her. Slap her. Do whatever it took to make her think logically.
“Damn you,” he said, “damn you, Alessandra…”
And then she was in his arms.
His mouth was on hers.
Her soft, lovely body was pressed to the long, hard length of his.
She was kissing him back even as she wept, and the world blurred.
His heart was pounding. He wanted to strip off his clothes and hers, take her right here against the wall.
No.
That was how he’d done things last night. She deserved more. Deserved better…
“Tanner.”
She whispered his name against his mouth.
God. She was going to ask him to stop. And he would, even though it would kill him…
“Please,” she said, “please, please, please. Make love to me. Tanner…”
He growled her name. Caught her up in his arms and carried her down the hall to the bedroom, his mouth on hers, her sweet taste filling him.
He lowered her to her feet. Shrugged off the MP7, his belt and the weapons of death it carried.
And suddenly realized he didn’t have a condom.
The realization made him groan.
“Sweetheart,” he said, “I don’t have a con—”
She covered his mouth with her fingers.
“We don’t need condoms. I’m protected.”
Tanner sent up a silent thank-you to any deities that might be in the vicinity. And
knew, as he reached for her again, that those words would be his last rational act.
She went into his arms, her mouth seeking his, her hands burrowing into his hair. He wanted to kiss her forever, sink his teeth lightly into the delicate fullness of her lower lip, feel the tip of her tongue dance against his, but his heart was thundering, his dick was so swollen it was almost painful.