Where There's Smoke

Then he turned her, and she landed on her back on the bed, the juncture of her thig

hs forming a cradle for his lowering head. He kissed her with unapologetic carnality. His mouth gently drew on her while his nimble tongue taught her things about herself she didn’t know. As though inside her head, taking directions from her thoughts, he knew exactly when to probe, when to stroke, when to sink his mouth into her, and when to withdraw and caress her with the very tip of his tongue.

By the time he rose above her, she was sated, replete, dewy with perspiration, and drunk with passion. Nevertheless, her slack lips awakened beneath his searching kiss. When he entered her, it was a beginning, not a benediction.

Tenderly he traced the scar on her shoulder with his fingertip. “It was bad, huh?”

“Very bad. For a while the doctors believed that I’d be extremely lucky to regain only partial use of my arm.”

“Knowing you, you were determined to prove them wrong.”

“After the wound healed, I spent months in physical therapy.”

For a moment he watched her reflectively. “I think you should stop punishing yourself for not dying with the rest of your family, Lara.”

“Is that what you think I’m about?”

“To an extent, yes.”

She came up on an elbow and surveyed his lean, naked body. In addition to the scar on his leg, there were many on his torso. “What about you? You’re reckless. You take senseless chances. What are you punishing yourself for?”

“It’s not the same thing,” he answered crossly. “I’m a thrillseeker for the sake of the thrill, that’s all.”

She gave him a look that said she wasn’t buying it. Her eyes wandered from one scar to the next. There was a particularly wicked one cutting a jagged line across his ribs beneath his right arm.

“Knife fight,” he said when she looked at him with a question in her eyes.

“Obviously you lost.”

“Actually I won.”

As to the fate of the loser, she was afraid to ask. “And this?”

“Plane crash. I walked away, but tore open my arm on a piece of fuselage.”

She marveled at his nonchalance. “Other than today, have you ever been in real danger of losing your life?”

“Once.”

“Tell me about it.”

“I got shot. Here,” he said, touching his newest scar, the one she was familiar with. “Nearly bled to death.”

Laughing, she tossed her hair over one shoulder. “It was more than a scratch, but certainly not a mortal wound.”

“I know that. But I wasn’t talking about the wound itself,” he said. “See, I stumbled into Doc Patton’s place, expecting him, but finding someone else. A woman.”

Lara became transfixed by his eyes and the hypnotic quality of his voice. “How was that life-threatening?” she asked huskily.

“I turned around and looked at her and thought, ‘Shit, Tackett, you’re a dead man.’ ”

She swallowed with difficulty. “We’re grown-ups, Key. Beyond the age of consent and too old to play games. I don’t expect hearts and flowers from you. You don’t have to profess—”

He laid his index finger vertically against her lips. “I’m not telling you this to get you into bed. You’re already here and I’ve already had you. I’m telling you because it’s the truth, and you know it as well as I do. We’re here together, like this, because we’ve wanted it from the beginning. We’ve both known that it was only a matter of time.”

He reached up to stroke her cheek. “Once we looked at each other, I didn’t stand a chance and neither did you. I wanted to fuck you on the spot.”

“Until you discovered who I was.”