Burning For Nero (SEALs Going Hot) (11 page)
Tessa and Cass had come here, too.
He blew out a gust of air.
Okay. Time to suit up
. He pulled his T-shirt over his head and marched out the door. He had a plan of attack that he’d now alter to her arrival here, but that was cool. He was nothing if not adaptable.
With only a look at his father and a nod to his mother and brother, he raised a brow at his sister and picked up Cassandra Phillips with one good arm, and marched toward the elevator.
He strode past doctors who smiled. Nurses who dropped their jaws in surprise. Orderlies who chuckled. A few men in uniform. One in a wheelchair who stared.
Meanwhile, Cass wriggled.
“Stop that.”
“Will you let me down?”
“No.” When the elevator opened, he stepped inside. The thing was small and they were luckily the only passengers. “Push one.”
She huffed, but did as she was told.
Getting the hang of this, are we?
“You should put me down. I’m heavy.”
“Not for me.” For a man who had lifted three times her weight when he was soaking wet, covered in sand, she was a twig. The door opened. Without breaking a sweat, he continued down the hall to the exit door.
“Open it,” he told her when they approached the glass portal.
She pushed it wide.
“Good girl.”
And he kept on walking across the covered porch. Overlooking the parking lot, he paused. He figured she had driven since Tessa hated to. “Where is your car?”
“To the far right.”
He took the stairs at a jog. She jiggled in his arm.
At her compliance, he suppressed a smartass grin.
He strode to the driver’s side and told her to get out her key and unlock the car. She struggled with her purse and he enjoyed every second of her contortions. As her key lock beeped, he resigned himself that he had to let her drive.
“Now hear this. I am putting you down and you will get in this car.”
“Yes, sir,” she said in a compliant little voice.
His cock twitched to life at her sexy tone. Oh, he planned to get her all to himself where she would never want to leave him. She landed on her feet, gaining her balance, then opened her door and sank into her bucket seat.
Once he was inside, she reached around him to help him secure his seatbelt. “Don’t want to lose you.”
He would have responded but the way she pressed against him, her full breasts flat to his chest had him thinking of more physical reactions to her leading statement. Gritting his teeth, restraining himself, he faced forward. “Go out the main entrance and turn right on Wisconsin Avenue.”
She checked his blank expression, then frowned. “I want to talk to you and I can’t do it well if I’m driving.”
“Agreed.” He shot her a stern look. “Just do as I ask.”
She raised her brows. Dark circles rimmed her eyes. Her face was drawn. Without any makeup, she was a beauty to him. Even dog-tired. The past two days had been one wild ride for them both. “I didn’t notice you were asking.”
He flexed his back. “Asking, needing you to do this. Drive.”
Pissed, she shoved the key into the ignition and squared her shoulders. They were well north of the medical center when he told her to take a right at the next street.
“We’re not going back to Annapolis?”
“We’re going to talk.”
She growled her objection, but turned at the light.
The sun was coming up, big, bold and brilliantly hot for a July day in the nation’s capital. Where they were going, he hoped it might be cool, pleasant, even breezy. He needed that kind of atmosphere for what he planned to tell her. She drove without question, a scowl marring her lovely features. That was okay. She’d have her say.
“Pull in to this street,” he told her as they came upon Rock Creek Park, the shady oasis that ran through the suburbs. “Park there and we’ll get out and walk.”
She wasn’t happy, but she did what he requested of her. When she stood before him, she put her hands on her hips and glared at him. “You better talk to me and fast, Lieutenant, because I don’t want to play games with you.”
He gave her a consoling smile, but he’d give her no quarter. He wanted what he came for and by god, he was going to get it too. “Let’s go in this direction. The path leads to a small stream. We’ll get out of the sun. What I have to say won’t take long and then how about I buy you breakfast before we go home?”
He guessed his conciliatory tone did the trick because she got the starch out of her spine and strolled beside him. As they entered a more secluded part of the path, he was grateful for the privacy. A few bikers were out, a few walkers with their dogs taking an early morning stroll.
“How’s Jon?”
Cass checked his expression, then tried hard to smile at him. “Fine. Sleeping peacefully when I left. I can’t thank you enough.”
“You will do a lot of things for me, but you won’t thank me for that ever again.”
She blinked at his reversal of tone. “Whatever you say. What did the doctor say about your arm?”
“It will get better. The physical therapy exercises I was given were not the right ones. Easy to mistake one kind of trauma for another, he said. I should be good to go back to active duty status in about two months.”
She inhaled. “I’m so relieved. I would hate to think that you were permanently injured because you saved Jon.”
He took her by the shoulders. “Look at me. You have to know that if I had been disabled by it, I would do it all again and again.”
She did smile at him then. Broadly. Tears collected in her lovely green eyes. “I do know that. I do.”
He wanted to hold her, pull her into him, caress her, keep her near him, safe and happy. But he had much to tell her and he’d save the embraces for later. If she agreed.
So he dropped his hands, stuck them in his pockets and walked forward. When she remained where she stood, he turned and urged her forward with a tilt of his head. “One issue that I debated this weekend was an opportunity to apply for an instructor’s position at SEALs training camp.”
“In California?”
“Yes.” Cass had visited there a few times when Ray and Tony were in BUD/s. As he remembered, she really liked the San Diego area and called it Shangri-La. “I wasn’t certain I would qualify what with a bum set of fingers and arm. Didn’t know if I should look into getting out of the Navy and going into civilian contracting.”
“Security work?”
He nodded, noting that she walked more easily beside him now. The topic, while it affected what happened to them both as a couple, had taken the pressure off their immediate problems in their relationship. And that murky issue was where he headed now.
“These past two days have changed us permanently, Cass.”
She halted, her facial expression set, unreadable. “We can’t be friends.”
“No. I can’t be.”
She bit her lower lip, wincing. “What do you want?”
“I want us to be together. As a couple.”
She drifted from a smile to a frown, between euphoria and heartache. “I told myself I wanted to move away from Virginia because I couldn’t be near you any longer and not—” She grabbed a breath. “Not have you.”
The urge to pick her up and whirl her around was a living animal inside him. But he stood his ground. “I want you to stay in Virginia for the next two months.”
She stared at him like he had grown two heads.
He laughed, joy laced with anguish. “Say yes.”
“Yes.”
“I want you to see me. Date me. Let me bring pizza on Friday nights and doughnuts Sunday mornings. Let’s go to the movies—”
“And let you fix the leaky faucets?”
The sun cast golden lights on her perfect complexion, giving her a glow that complemented the delight he saw written on her face. “That, too, sweetheart. Let me be with you and with Jon.”
She beamed at him, her green eyes verdant in the leafy splendor of the woods.
“Say yes, Cass.”
“Yes.”
“But at the end of two months, we will stop.”
“Why?” Her voice was a wisp of air. Her sadness turning the corners of her mouth down.
“Because I will know more about my rehab. Whether I stay in Virginia, go to Coronado or resign my commission.” He stepped up to her and ran his hands up her arms. “I will make a decision. And so must you.”
She was so still, she frightened him. She searched his eyes and finally said, “I will.”
“You’ll give us a chance?” he asked, incredulous, even though she had agreed to it all.
“Of course, I will.” She grinned at him, her whole heart in her face. “I was an idiot to leave you yesterday. I was afraid of having you and losing you. Afraid and silly. I was such a fool to think that I could separate who you are from what you are. Call me temporarily blind, but last night when Jon went into the water and you went after him, I saw instantly that I can’t predict what happens to me or you, or even Jon. I can’t refuse to live because I’m afraid someone I love will die.”
Stunned, he clutched her close. Hearing her say the words he wanted from her was like having a bolt of lightning hit him.
She stood on her toes, wrapped her arms around his shoulders and put her warm sweet lips to his. Her kiss knocked him crazy. With one strong arm around her, he hauled her even closer.
She cupped his face. “I love you.”
He shook his head, smiling. “Repeat again, please.”
“I love you.”
He kissed her like a mad man. “Interference on the network. Say again.”
“I love you deeply, madly, crazy wild. Can you believe it?”
“God, lady, I am trying hard.” He shook his head. “Buzzing in my ears. Must be a new condition I have.”
She ground her hips against him, his erection a mighty force between them. “I like this condition. Maybe we could get a room somewhere and apply some physical therapy to that?”
He threw back his head and chuckled. “Not on your life!”
“What?” She was shocked, dismayed, but still wearing a grin. “Why not?”
“For one thing, it is eight in the morning and we could never get in to a hotel room before two.”
“Well, I am not going back to Annapolis to make love to you in that boathouse. Every member of the family would be lurking outside, if I know them, listening to how we made up!”
“And for another thing, we are not making love again for a long, long time.”
She froze. Blinked. “That dip in the river clogged your brain, Lieutenant.”
He gripped her hands. “No. No, no. You listen to me. In the next two months, sex is not in the plan.”
“Now I know you are delusional.” She stepped away from him. “Come on. I’m driving you home where you can go sleep in your bedroom in your parents’ house. Just like a kid. As for me, I’ll be in that damn little boathouse.” She flipped her head around. “Alone.” Then she trudged off back down the path to her car.
He jogged to catch up with her. “What will it take to get you to agree with me?”
“No sex? No fun? No nothing for two months?” She shot her brows high, aghast.
“I think it’s best. Then you’ll be deciding if we’re meant for each other in all the other ways.”
She grabbed him by yanking a handful of his tee shirt. “Listen to me, Great Nero. I have burned for you long enough and I’m not waiting any longer. Hear me?”
He nodded, liking the way this negotiation was going. “I do. I do. So what assurance do I get for making wild monkey love with you every chance I get?”
She put her hand on her hip and wiggled her brows at him. “You get to marry me, big boy. In two months.”
He should have collected all his teeth that had fallen out of his mouth, but instead he watched her walk away and he hustled to catch up with her. “You’ll marry me?”
“Get ready.” She kept going.
He whirled her around into his arms, laughing like a fool. “You’re sure?”
“No reservations. Life is to be lived. I’m ready. Now come on, sailor. I have a wedding to plan and you have PT to do.”
“I do, don’t I?” He was so damn pleased with himself, he thought he’d burst.
“Yes, because the next time you carry me anywhere, it’s over a threshold. And I will be upright in both your arms.”
He kissed her then, long and hard. “And you will stay there for years to come.”
“You bet your tight ass, I will. Now come home.”
About the Author
Cerise is a world-wide traveler who has lived in Japan, Washington D.C. and Italy. Today, she lives—and writes—in wild, west Texas where a never-ending stream of cowboys, vaqueros, para-military types and diplomats stroll into town—and fuel her imagination for red hot affaires. An award-winning author of more than two dozen romances and mysteries, Cerise creates heroes readers crave!
Visit Cerise at
To chat with Cerise DeLand and other Wild Rose Press authors of erotic romance, join us at www.groups.yahoo.com/group/thewilderroses.
Coming Soon
Catching Eagle’s Eye
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Book Three
SEALs Going Hot
SEAL sniper, Dane Sawyer, is known as Eagle Eye for his deadly aim. He’s also good at hiding his identity as a gay Dom. Childhood trauma has led him to live and play deep in the closet. Then a bullet to his thigh lands him on leave and in the incredible hands of a hot ensign assigned to get him back in the field.
Will Chadwick is happy to finally be living as an openly gay man in the Navy. And as a physical therapist, he’s used to coaxing bad asses like Dane into doing their PT. Harder for him is resisting the temptation that Dane presents. He’s a patient and hiding his sexuality. A prudent man would keep his distance.
But Dane doesn’t know how to quit, and seducing Will has become a mission. The budding sub in Will can’t resist the Dom’s commands. If he could only make Dane see that being a man doesn’t mean hiding his true self.
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