All Kinds of Tied Down (Marshals 1)

“Oh shit,” I gasped, not sure where I could touch and not hurt him.

“I have a concussion,” he announced. “You gotta take care of me.”

I held out my arms for him. “Of course.”

He staggered forward and gave me his weight, head down on my shoulder, arms wrapping me up tight.

“That’s an Airborne insignia,” the guy I would no longer be fucking choked out. “Holy shit, man.”

All I knew was that my partner was Special Forces. I never delved, it wasn’t my place. “You can go,” I said quickly, more content to have the man I wanted leaning on me, almost asleep on his feet, his breath puffing over the side of my neck, than I wanted to have sex with a guy I’d known for a couple of hours.

“Whatever, man, fuck you.”

The slam of the door jolted Ian, and he clutched at me.

“It’s okay. Let’s get you upstairs. You can have my bed.”

“No,” he moaned, “the couch. I dreamed about the couch.”

It was an overstuffed two-piece microfiber sectional sofa. There was nothing remotely interesting about it, but he started stripping as he walked—hat, jacket, belt—and then flopped down on it, toed off his untied heavy combat boots, and shucked his pants, followed quickly by his socks. He shoved one of the many pillows littering the couch under his head, sighed deeply, and stopped moving. After a few moments of admiring the long, muscular body stretched out before me, I covered him with a chunky cable-knit throw.

I picked up after him, put all his clothes in the washer, and sat down to read. After twenty minutes or so, he woke up, moved over, put the pillow in my lap, and lay back down.

“Supposed to watch me,” he mumbled before he fell asleep again.

And I wondered at that moment why he was at my house instead of with Emma, but it didn’t bother me enough to question him, not enough to call her and have her come over and collect him. I wanted him right where he was, solid and in one piece.

“Miro?”

“Sorry,” I said quickly, embarrassed that my mind had been wandering, her voice bringing me back to the present. “And I’m sorry things ended like they did.”

“It’s fine, I’m already over it.”

I hoped that was true. “Bye, Emma.”

“Good-bye, Miro. You were actually my favorite part of knowing Ian Doyle.”

It was sad, and I was still thinking that when I looked up and found him standing at the top of the stairs. “Speak of the devil.”

He grunted. “What’re you doing?”

“Deleting pictures off your phone,” I informed him.

“You get ’em all?”

“I did, yeah.”

“That’s good.” He yawned softly. “Healthy.”

“Like you would know from healthy,” I grumbled.

“Hey, I forgot to grab something to sleep in. I need pajamas or shorts or whatever.”

“Check my closet,” I directed, placing his phone on my nightstand. “Top drawer of the armoire. Take your pick.”

He was shirtless, so I got a nice view of the washboard abs, muscular chest, and the obliques shown off by the worn jeans as he moved around the bed. I could also see a myriad of scars from knives, bullets, and—my favorite—a bull whip. A corrupt warlord in some little cesspool of the world had actually flogged him. I had been horrified when he explained the evidence left behind on his skin, but Ian being Ian just shrugged. I tried not to let my mind drift to the horrors visited on him when I hadn’t been there keeping vigil. As far as I could tell, the people who were supposed to have his back hadn’t been very good at protecting him or… the opposite was true and they were fantastic and whip scars were simply the tip of the iceberg of what could have happened. Not that he talked about it. I only knew about the incident with the whip because he’d confessed it to me late one evening when he was very drunk. I’d wanted to touch him then, and I wanted to touch him now. The desire to slide my hands over his hard muscular frame, to have those thick arms wrapped around me, and to lick every inch of his sleek olive skin was a constant craving. I was ready to taste him, have him, and keep him the second he gave the word.

“Gross, dude, there’s thongs in here,” he called out from the other side of the wall.

Shit.

He was rummaging around in my stuff and that was my mistake. Nothing killed heat like comments on your fucking underwear.

“Just grab something and get out,” I yelled, sitting up, needing to change clothes myself.

“Don’t be so fuckin’ sensitive.” He chuckled, keeping up the running dialogue. “I’m sure guys love it when you wear froufrou crap like this.”

“I have a gun,” I warned instead of screaming. I so needed a vacation far away from him.