When he leaned in closer and brushed her lips with his, she put one hand on the back of his neck while the other rested near his heart.
She pulled back. “I want to trust you. I don’t know how. I’ve never done it before.”
Gunner pulled back and looked into her eyes. “That is probably the most honest thing you’ve ever said to me.” He kissed her again, this time deeper, with more of the passion he was trying so hard to rein in.
He sat back and looked up at the stars. “I don’t want to do the wrong thing. Other than when I’ve been working an op and doing the wrong thing would mean either I or someone on my team would die, I don’t remember feeling this way. At least not as strongly. I kinda feel like I’m walking on eggshells.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I’m afraid of saying the wrong thing.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. I just want you to know that this is important to me. You’re important to me.” He shook his head. “I’m not accustomed to saying that.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever said it,” she admitted.
“Raketa, I…”
She kept her gaze on him while he struggled with what he wanted to say.
“Earlier…what I said…I don’t know how to apologize without making it worse. Not for us being together, but for making you think I regretted it.”
“Don’t you?”
He leaned forward again. “Not in the way you’re thinking right now. I regret that I didn’t take better care of you…” He laughed. “I’m sorry I wasn’t a better lover.”
Raketa smiled, but just slightly. “So certain it was terrible. That’s how I know you don’t remember.”
“I don’t know what your benchmark is, but I can assure you, I can do better.”
“My what? A mark?”
“It means something to measure against, like a comparison.”
“Ah. I don’t have a benchmark, Gunner. I didn’t before that night, and I still don’t.”
He scrubbed his face with his hand. Did she mean what he was thinking? Nah, that couldn’t be.
“Now I’m the one who doesn’t understand.”
“You’re the only man I’ve been with,” she told him.
Jesus—and he was drunk. He felt like the biggest asshole who’d ever lived, and he had no idea what to say. He rested his head against the back of the chair and looked at the stars for the second time. He couldn’t say he was sorry again. What would she think he was sorry for? “I’m back to not having any idea what to say.”
“There isn’t anything—”
When she stood and it appeared she was heading inside, Gunner grabbed her and pulled her into his lap. He gripped one side of her face while he held her tight to him with the other. He struggled with words and then gave up. Instead, he’d use his mouth in another way to tell her how he felt.
He kissed her, harder than he had before. He explored her mouth with his tongue, wanting to know every crevice, every hidden inch of her body. Tonight he would, because tonight he would do what he should’ve done the first time they were together.
He stood with her still in his arms and carried her into the house.
“I want you to trust me. Just this, Raketa. Trust this,” he said as he laid her body on the bed.
She nodded, the look in her eyes equally heated and anxious.
He hovered above her. “Tonight won’t just be sex, Rocket Girl. I’m going to learn as much as I can about your body, and you’re going to do the same with mine.”