The Officer Breaks the Rules (18 page)

He was tall, that was easy to see, even from the computer screen. And his voice was
something straight out of a movie, with his deep Southern drawl. She wondered where
he’d grown up. What his life had been like before the Marines. What made him join
the military in the first place. What he’d kiss like.

What
he’d kiss like?
She barely caught the laugh that rose up her throat by slapping a hand over her mouth.
Watching his chest rise and fall for another few moments, she finally made herself
end the call and close down the Skype program.

But while he intrigued her to no end, she knew he wasn’t the one for her. Dating wasn’t
even a viable option right now. And when it was, it would be with a man who didn’t
intimidate her so much with his… well, his attractiveness, for starters. One who wouldn’t
completely blindside her with his charm, disarm her with his smile. One who wasn’t
completely out of her league in almost every respect.

She had to be reasonable, after all.

She shut the computer down, padded to her own room, and climbed in her own bed under
the sheets she’d picked out herself. And after a quick round of prayers, she turned
off the light and snuggled down, hugging a pillow to her chest.

But until the time came for her to be reasonable, Dwayne Robertson would make a lovely
dream.

***

Madison rolled over and smacked her nose into a hard wall of warm muscle. She cracked
one eye and found Jeremy looking right at her, looming over her, propped up on one
elbow. The sheet covered his hips, barely. But the not-so-small bump under the fabric
told her he was wide awake, in every way possible.

“Morning,” she said.

He didn’t answer.

She tried again. “Sleep well?”

He shook his head. “You hog the covers, you know.”

“You hog the bed, so we’re even.” She was prepared to roll back the other way and
grab another hour of sleep when he hooked one arm beneath her and tugged her to the
center of the bed.

“I beg your pardon!” She slapped at him playfully when he pulled her shirt up and
over her head. “This is not the wake-up call I ordered.”

“You get what you get, and you’ll like it.” With zero finesse, he latched his mouth
onto her breast and pulled deeply.

She moaned, arching into him. Gone was the playful, silly, laughing lovemaking from
nights past. Something seemed to be driving him that wasn’t humor-based. That wasn’t
built on fun, motivated on a good time. It was almost…

Desperate. That was the only word her mind could form when he came up for air shortly,
moving to her other breast, his hand closing over the first, pulling and toying with
her nipple.

“Jeremy. Slow down.”

“Can’t.” He surged up, capturing her protesting mouth with his, sliding his tongue
in, silencing all possible complaints or questions. Her hands automatically went to
his hair, tunneling through for a good grip. His chest hair abraded her now-sensitive
nipples, and she couldn’t decide whether to rub against him or pull back from the
sensation.

One knee nudged her thighs apart, settled there, pressing against her center. With
every slight movement, he brushed against her and she felt a familiar twinge low in
her belly. She pulled back from his mouth long enough to ask, “Are you trying to drive
me crazy?”

“Is that what’s happening?” he answered her question with one of his own. Damn, she
hated when he did that. But his mouth was too busy to give a different answer, moving
down her throat, down her sternum, over her ribs, down to the edge of the waistband
of her shorts, tugging down harshly as he went.

Before she could even kick off the shorts from her left leg, he was back up, fitting
himself to her and thrusting up. His face was a mask of someone she’d never met before.
Impassive almost, if she didn’t know better. Like her body could have belonged to
anyone and it wouldn’t have mattered. She cried out, not in pain but in a mixture
of fullness and confusion. Where was Jeremy? Her Jeremy?

He slowed at her sound, then stopped. Breathing hard, completely still but for the
in-and-out motion of his chest, she watched as some of the coolness left his eyes.
His forehead came down to hers, sweaty and warm. And he pushed in again, slower this
time, more controlled. More aware of her body, her reactions, her needs.

One hand reached between them, found her clit, and applied pressure and motion until
she couldn’t stop her own reaction. She moved with him, following his pattern until
the point of no return came and went.

“Jeremy. Jer—I’m going to…”

She tightened around him, and when he leaned over and whispered, “Come,” in her ear,
she had no choice but to follow his command, muffling the worst of her scream into
his shoulder as she felt his own release take him over.

***

He was a shit. A total piece of shit.

No, worse. What was worse than shit?

Jeremy Phillips. That’s what.

He disengaged all limbs from Madison and pulled out, regretting the instant loss of
warmth as he flopped onto his back.

“Mad, I’m sorry. I forgot…” He couldn’t believe it. Never, not once in his adult life,
had he ever forgotten protection. And with the one woman he wanted to protect the
most, he fucked up.

Wasn’t that just the way of it?

She turned her head and smiled lazily, hand coming up to smooth his hair back. “Condom?
Yeah, I realized that about two seconds after you were in.”

She knew and said nothing? “So we’re good?”

“I’m on the pill, if you don’t remember.” When he looked at her funny, she laughed.
“What did you think I was doing when I took a pill with breakfast all the times I’ve
been over here? That wasn’t a Flintstones vitamin, buddy.”

“Oh. Okay.” Suddenly he had a moment of stark disappointment, followed swiftly by
horrified confusion. Disappointment? That he wouldn’t get her pregnant? The girl he
wasn’t supposed to be seeing in the first place? Right. He could see how that convo
would go with Tim.

So, uh, don’t freak out but… your sister’s knocked up. It’s mine, but, really, no
clue how that happened. Guess it jumped in there while we weren’t looking.

Yeah. Better this way.

“That was the most amazing progression of facial expressions I’ve ever seen.” Madison
drew a finger from his forehead down his nose to tap his chin. “What’s going on in
there?”

“Nothing.” He rolled over and sat on the edge of the bed, his back to her. Scrubbing
one hand down his face, he stood and grabbed the closest pair of shorts available
and stepped into them. Then he checked the clock. “It’s really late. I was about to
suggest breakfast, but lunch seems more appropriate.”

He heard her sit up and tempted fate by turning around enough to see her. Her hair
was a wreck, frizzy in places, flattened down in others. Her face was completely free
of makeup, the way he really liked. And she clutched the sheets from his bed to her
chest in some vague attempt at modesty.

All he wanted to do was rip his shorts back off, tear the sheet away, and start the
day all over again, taking care with her this time. Doing it right. Not letting himself
go like an animal.

“You don’t have to be so upset, you know.”

Her lips were moving, but the words weren’t connecting in his brain.

She smiled. “I’m not upset. It’s fine. This affair has two people in it, you know.
I get what I want. You should get what you want and need too. You needed the release,
you got it. There’s no harm in that.”

Ha. Right. “I’m not in the mood to leave the apartment. Do you want Chinese or pizza?”

Her brows knit together, but she didn’t push further. “How about that sub place that
delivers?”

“Done.” Anything to keep from having the deep, meaningful conversation she was clearly
looking to have. “You okay with splitting a sub with me?”

“Sounds good.” She gingerly stepped out of bed, letting the sheet fall as she shivered
when her bare feet hit the tile. “You could get a freaking rug or something for in
here, Phillips.”

“Don’t go all Martha Stewart on me,” he warned as he headed for his computer to look
up the number and the online menu.

“I’m taking a shower,” Madison called out after Jeremy as he scrolled through the
bookmarked sites of places to eat in town.

“Fine, fine.” He found the number, called in an order, and paid by credit card over
the phone. The sound of running water from the bathroom filled the small apartment.
He grabbed two bottles of water and a couple of paper towels to double as napkins
and set them on the poor excuse for a coffee table in preparation for their lunch’s
arrival.

And realized how homey and easy the whole thing was. Rolling out of bed on a lazy
Sunday afternoon with nothing to do and nowhere to go… at least for now. Madison had
work later that night. Ordering lunch in because neither wants to leave the house.
Sharing a sandwich. Madison in his shower.

Something he could get used to. Way too easily.

Danger signs flashed in his mind just as the bathroom door opened. He heard some rustling
in the bedroom area, then Madison appeared wearing a button-down shirt of his and,
well, he wasn’t quite sure if anything else was under it, since the shirt hung down
to basically her knees.

She followed his gaze down the front of her body and back up, an amused grin on her
face. “Sorry, I just wasn’t really ready to put my own stuff back on right now. Do
you mind?” She lifted one hand to run her fingers through damp hair, pressing the
shirt tighter against her breasts. The outline of one puckered nipple showed clear
through the light fabric. The hem rose up, tempting him to look and see if she had
on shorts beneath, but he couldn’t tell.

“What’s on under there?” he asked hoarsely.

“Do you really want to know?” Her eyes twinkled with impish humor.

No. “Yes.”

She sashayed a few steps forward, brushing by him with barely a touch, a whisper of
feminine scent following in her wake. “That’s a secret. Maybe you can find out later.
Mind if I check my email really fast while we wait?”

He cleared his throat. “No, not at all.” To get rid of the horrible, immature squeak
his throat was threatening to make, he opened one of the bottles of water and chugged
until he couldn’t breathe, tanking down over half the bottle before he stopped. Clearing
his throat again, he felt a little better.

“You coming down with something?” Madison asked over the click of keys. “Need me to
take a look?”

“No. I’m good. Allergies or something,” he lied, sinking down to the couch. He examined
his living room one more time and saw, really saw it through Madison’s eyes. Or, at
least, what he assumed would be her eyes.

Sagging couch that the Goodwill wouldn’t take as a donation. Nothing matching. The
main focus of the room was his baby, the forty-two inch plasma flat-screen TV. The
only piece of furniture worth a damn was the TV stand, and that’s only because he
refused to have his flat-screen resting on anything that might break and let it fall.
But even it didn’t match.

It looked like he didn’t give a damn. And he hadn’t, at least up to now. The rest
of his life wasn’t how he wanted it, so why should his apartment be any different?
But why was it bothering him so much?

He caught another look at Madison from the corner of his eye and watched her cross
one leg over the other, her dainty bare foot swinging to some unheard rhythm in her
mind.

That’s why. When it was just him, it didn’t matter. When the guys came over—which
wasn’t often, because he didn’t have much room—they understood. It was just a guy’s
place to crash. But seeing Madison among the furnishings that screamed
I
don’t give a shit
made him feel… incomplete somehow. Not that he had to rush out and Martha Stewart
the place, like he’d said. But he was almost thirty-three years old. Was he not a
little too old to be doing the college dorm look? The
whatever’s free and easy to carry
style of the newly graduated, living on a shoestring budget crowd?

Yes. He was. And it didn’t matter that Madison wouldn’t be around to see the transformation.
He was determined to set some shit straight. He deserved better. Nobody else would
believe he deserved better if he didn’t think so himself.

Holy shit. He deserved better. Why did that sound so foreign to him?

“Why haven’t you signed these yet?”

He shook off the mental wanderings and squinted at the paper Madison held up. Then
felt his blood turn cold.

His re-up papers.

Stalking over, he grabbed the paper from her hand, sliding the folder from her other
hand and setting them back on top of his computer tower. “Leave those alone.”

She stared at him, like trying to put together a puzzle piece. “I mean, I don’t get
why you haven’t signed them yet. It’s not that hard, right? You just put your name
on the dotted line. The CO signed them more than a week ago, from the date under his
signature.”

“Leave it alone, Madison.”

“Isn’t that what you want to do? Stay in for the twenty?”

What
you
want
to
do…
He spun on his heel and headed back for the water he’d abandoned. Suddenly the closed-off
feeling in his throat was back.

“That’s why you said we wouldn’t work out long-term. Isn’t it? Navy and Marine Corps,
not matching up, hard to raise a family.” She gave a hollow laugh. “Not taking into
account the whole best friend’s sister part, since I still think you’re overexaggerating
how Tim would react.”

He uncapped the water, forcing his hand to relax before he crushed the plastic. “Stop.”

She sat back, chair squeaking in protest. “I have to say, while I don’t like it, your
theory on why we wouldn’t work out long-term? I understand it. I think if two people
cared, they could make it work. But I do understand. The thing that gets me, though,
is this was your choice. It was one of the big factors in why you were keeping me
at a distance. Your career, the biggest thing in your life. And yet you still haven’t
signed the papers. It’s not like there’s any ceremony that goes along with it. You
just sign, turn them back in. I’ve never even seen someone take them home before.”
Tilting her head, she studied him. “You do want to stay in, don’t you?”

“Madison.” Her name was a plea to drop it. Not that she listened.

“Because if you don’t, then I think you have a really good shot at making it as a
writer.”

“Stop!” He threw the now-empty plastic bottle against the wall next to the front door,
startling even himself with the sharpness of his voice. “Just leave it the fuck alone.”
Hearing her voice the one dream he’d been secretly harboring for years, the one thing
he’d never told anyone. Ever. The one thing he knew would never in a million years
happen. It hurt. Hurt more than he realized it could, to hear someone else say it
out loud. As if she’d opened up some long-forgotten, well-hidden old wound just to
pour some acid in there and stitch him back up again.

Madison’s wide eyes narrowed. In sympathy. No, in pity, dammit, which was worse. “Are
you scared you couldn’t make it work?”

“No. Because there’s nothing to work. I’m a Marine. My father was a Marine. If I have
kids, I’m sure the legacy will pass down from there.” Marines, Marines everywhere.

“Whose dream is that?” she asked softly. “Is that what you’d really want? Consigning
your kids to the same lack of choice that you had?”

“You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

“Do you think—”

“I’m taking a shower. If the delivery guy comes, just sign my name on the receipt.
The tip is already included.” Before she could say another word, he stormed into the
bathroom—the one place in the apartment with a door that locked—and shut it, leaning
his back against the scarred wood.

Goddamnit. She was going to leave, and he couldn’t blame her. Who the fuck would want
to stay after he all but let her have it for asking questions? Questions that ripped
at his basic desires, made him think about things he had no right to dream about or
feel. Dreams that, after he signed those papers Monday morning, would be all but dead.

So now he’d lost a little piece of his heart in two huge ways.

***

Madison stared sightlessly at the bathroom door, wanting to be aware if he came back
out again. But no noise could be heard from the tiny room. No water running, no shower
curtain being moved. Not even the sound of him kicking something. Nothing. It was
almost frightening how still he had to be to achieve that silence.

Following his blowup, the eerie silence was deafening. Not to mention the blowup itself
had been… unexpected. But at the same time, almost refreshing. Jeremy had always been
the most calm of the three guys. The most placid, feathers rarely ruffled. She’d always
looked at Jeremy through the theory of still waters running deep. But Madison had
always sensed he needed to release something. That he held back for who knew what
reason.

She swiveled back around and stared once more at the papers, now a little crinkled,
sitting on the computer tower. She hadn’t meant to pry, but they’d been right there.
And she wasn’t about to let that go unanswered. Those papers were so simple. Just
a signature committing to another three years. No pomp or circumstance involved. People
walked into the office, signed, and walked back out again.

So why was he taking so long to sign them if this was what he really wanted?

She had a distinct feeling the answer revolved around his father, this legacy he mentioned,
rather than any actual desire to serve more than what he’d already put in.

The bathroom door opened and he stepped out but didn’t glance her way, heading instead
for the bedroom area. She started to head that direction, but a knock at the front
door had her detouring.

“Can you grab that?” he asked.

“Yeah. I’ve got it.” She snagged a pen from the desk to sign the receipt, then opened
the door. “Hey, thanks for—oh, shit.”

Tim’s back was turned to the door, as if he was already heading down the steps. He
turned slowly at the sound of her voice, eyes raking over her from head to toe.

In moments of high stress, Madison knew from working in the ER, the brain had the
most amazing ability to move at warp speed but allow you to process the scene as if
it were moving in slow motion. You could have several minutes’ worth of thoughts in
only a nanosecond worth of time.

Okay. This was not a disaster. It was already past noon. She was friends with Jeremy.
She could have just stopped by to hang out and watch a movie and eat some lunch. No
big deal.

But when Tim’s face turned a rather unflattering shade of purple, she knew playing
it off as a simple friendly visit was a no-go. The time of day might not have been
a dead giveaway. But her appearance, that was another story. Her hair, still damp
from the shower she’d taken, hung around her shoulders, already a little wavy as it
air-dried. Her breasts, no bra in sight, were pressed against the fabric of Jeremy’s
button-down shirt, a shirt that was long enough to cover the clean pair of boxer shorts
she’d tossed on, and no shoes, making her look completely naked under the shirt.

She crossed her arms over her chest—partly in annoyance and partly to hide her breasts.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, accusation clear in her tone.

“What am I doing—what the fuck are you doing here?”

She gave it one last-ditch effort. “What, I’m not allowed to hang out with Jeremy?”

Tim stomped to the door, standing over her by a good eight inches. Damn, she wished
she was wearing heels right about now. “Squirt, you’re not dressed for a friendly
game of chess and a movie, are you?”

“Don’t call me that.” She pushed at his chest. “And stop acting like this. It’s none
of your business why I’m here.”

“I’m your brother. It’s always my business.”

“God, what is this? 1812? Jesus, Tim. Back off. My personal life is none of your—”

“You.” Tim uttered the single syllable with such quiet, intense menace she took a
quick step back in automatic response. Never before had she feared her brother, even
when they were children and fought like cats and dogs. The tone of his voice, though,
was something she’d never heard before. And she didn’t like it.

But he wasn’t looking at her. No. His eyes were focused over her right shoulder.

She turned to see Jeremy standing there, with khaki cargo shorts on but hands frozen
on the third button of his own button-down shirt, the rest of the fabric open to reveal
his chest.

Oh, boy.

Before she could react, Tim sidestepped her and was in the apartment. One fist clenched
at his side, he pointed a shaking finger at Jeremy. “I’m seeing things. Right? She’s
not seriously here after spending the night. Is she?”

The question seemed to unlock Jeremy, and he finished the third button, disregarding
the rest. “None of your business, O’Shay.”

“Which O’Shay? Your best friend? Or the girl you’re fucking?”

“Hey!” Madison shoved at his arm, but he didn’t budge. “Go home.”

“Watch yourself, Tim.” Jeremy’s voice dropped, taking on the same lethal edge that
Tim’s had. “Say whatever the fuck you want about me. Leave her out of it.”

“Like you did?” Tim ran a hand over his hair. “My sister, dude. What the hell?”

“We didn’t exactly plan—”

Jeremy couldn’t finish the statement before Tim’s fist plowed straight into his jaw
and knocked Jeremy to the ground. Taken off guard, he sat stunned for a moment on
the floor, then stood slowly. Tim shook his right hand out, and Madison could already
see the reddened skin of her brother’s hand, knew his knuckles had to be killing him.
A jaw punch, bone meeting bone, was never a pleasant thing to feel… on either side.

“Oh my God, and it’s come to this.” Madison, accepting the fact there was nothing
she could do to stop the insane, and completely moronic, male ritual of beating the
shit out of each other, sat on the far end of the couch, arms still crossed over her
chest, and mentally started triaging the possible injuries two very stupid males in
a fistfight could develop.