“You stole my line.” He tucked an errant strand of hair behind her ear. He’d mussed her up good.
She grinned, a big, happy, wow-we-really-just-did-that smile that he wanted to see again today, tomorrow and fifty years from now. Hell.
“I’ll wait while you come up with something,” she murmured.
She’d be waiting awhile. It seemed she’d knocked all the words right out of his head. What they’d shared had been fantastic, mind-blowing and slightly kinky sex. If it had been any better, he’d be dead. He could handle whatever she threw at him sexually. The adjectives? Not so much.
So instead, he draped an arm over her waist, just in case she had any thoughts of hopping out of bed and making a run for it. He never quite knew where he stood with Maddie. Maybe she’d change her mind about their vacation hookup.
About them.
Not that there was really a them since he was dating her under false pretenses, but the fantasy was an awesome one.
Running his fingers over the tattoo on her hip, he thought about the words she’d chosen to ink into her flesh. More than a catbird. He’d seen plenty of tattoos. It was practically obligatory to get one after a tour of duty, and this must have taken hours. It was a serious commitment. Since the last time he’d gotten her naked, reading hadn’t been number one on his to-do list. He’d settled for admiring the delicate flowers swirling over her hip bone and around the ornate line of text. Nothing simple for her.
“You ever going to tell me the story behind your tattoo?”
She patted him sleepily on his chest. “You distract me when I’m naked.”
He traced the words with his finger. “Spill.”
“You’re so sure there’s a story?” she scoffed.
Yeah, he was, so he stayed silent. Sure enough, she sighed and kept on talking.
“It’s part of an Ogden Nash poem,” she said.
“I guess I should ask you who you were thinking of when you got your ink.” Not that he really wanted to know. He’d rather run his fingers over her ink—over her bare skin—instead of thinking about the other men who had undoubtedly shared her life.
“Myself,” she said, surprising him. “There’s no guy out there with a matching poem, if that’s what you’re asking.”
He wanted to crush her against him, to give her another kiss. Hell, he was seconds away from volunteering to get ink with her, despite his dislike of needles.
“Why this poem?” He brushed his fingers over the words. They meant something to Maddie.
“The poem’s about love,” she said softly. “About loving more than other people hate. Ogden Nash was all in when it came to loving. I like that.”
He should back off, should let go of his Maddie fantasies—because, whether she admitted it or not, that poem announced in indelible ink that she was holding out for love and forever, and he simply wasn’t the man she thought he was. Hell, he wasn’t even a real chef.
“Do you have to go?” Her fingers twisted in his dog tags.
“Not yet,” he said, gazing down at her and tenderly stroking his thumb along her cheek. “But soon. I have an early-morning work call.”
He knew he had to let go of her, no matter how impossible it seemed at the moment. One more kiss, one more night, he decided.
He’d never had a lover like Maddie, so willing to try anything. Possibly everything. There was shit you didn’t do, didn’t ask for. Shit you sure as hell didn’t expect.
“Okay,” she mumbled drowsily, already drifting off. Too much champagne, too much sex.
“Good night, sweetheart,” he whispered, feathering kisses against her hair. It was stupid, since she was already out, but he wanted to do it even if he had no idea why. She’d wanted sex and he’d given it to her. Emotions weren’t supposed to be part of their date night, particularly when he hadn’t been up-front with her. And it wasn’t as if he was some big feelings expert. He’d only had the one lover, when he was just a kid, and she’d been his wife. He’d screwed that up.
Everything since then had been sex, but he hadn’t been shooting for any kind of world record—or any kind of relationship. Sometimes, if he got a little too lonely or the woman was a little too pretty, he started to wonder what-if. He didn’t have to wonder with Maddie. She was downright beautiful inside and out, and it was that inside part that made him regret not having met her under better circumstances, in a time and place where he wasn’t shipping out and wedded to Uncle Sam.