SEAL Under Covers (SEAL Brotherhood Series Book 3) (16 page)

He scanned the room, looking for someone who was too interested in their kiss, but found no one.

“I’m sorry he hurt you. You didn’t do anything to deserve that.” He delivered this while watching one tear trickle down her right cheek. “You deserve to—” He looked down at their entwined fingers. He drew them to his mouth and kissed her knuckles.

“Can you take me home?” she asked, her eyes full and moist. Her innocence took his breath away. The idea that she wanted to make love to him in his bed suddenly sent him into full arousal. He had not brought a woman to his inner sanctum since he became a SEAL.

Of course he would take her home.

Chapter 14

They left her rental car parked and he helped her into his Hummer.

“I like this one better,” she said, admiring the shiny black paint job, so unlike Fredo’s beater, and the fact that the smooth leather seats and dark interior smelled like Armando instead of fast food wrappers.

He reached behind her to strap her in, and she couldn’t help but touch the thick muscle at the side of his neck, following it up with a kiss.

“I’d like to make it to a bed, if you don’t mind.” His bright white smile dazzled her insides. The anticipation of what was to follow gave her butterflies. She was short of breath.

“I don’t mind.” She let her fingers trace down around the front of his T-shirt, coming up the other side, and then drifting into the hair behind his left ear. Armando’s dark features reminded her of delicious milk chocolate. She watched his lips come towards hers, and respectfully catch a nibble. She rode the crest of his scent as she squeezed his curly hair between her fingers. Then her palms came to rest on his chest as he leaned into her touch.

He was pure sexual candy. And he was going to let her indulge as much as she could handle.

Am I ready for this?

She knew the answer to her question as the door closed and he walked in front of the truck on his way to mounting the driver’s side. She knew his sure hands that started the vehicle, shifted the gears, and gripped the steering wheel would play her body like an instrument. His lips and tongue would find her in all the ways that mattered. She would give herself completely to him in every sense of the word.

Except tell him the truth about what she did. That part she had to keep to herself.

The pulsing down low under her panties warmed her as her sex felt swollen. She watched his face in profile as they threaded their way through streets she didn’t recognize, until they drove down a narrow, tree-lined street lined with bungalows featuring Spanish red-tiled roofs. That’s when she noticed the sliver of a view of the ocean beyond. In the distance, foamy water spray danced and played with the sparkling white beach.

She followed him up a red concrete walkway to a rounded front door with a metal cross-grate over a tiny center window. He stopped. Even the way he inserted his key into the lock was sexy, as he stood with one hip cocked, his muscled arm—the one with the frog footprint tattoos extending from inside his wrist to the bend in his arm—extended. He opened the door a crack and turned to her.

“You sure about this?” His smile was far from angelic.

“Absolutely. I like your house already.”

His answer was to take her in his arms, press his lips to hers and devour any niggling hesitation.

Once inside, he closed the door quietly behind them as she examined the rough-hewn beams of the living room’s vaulted ceiling. It looked like a home from a 1930s movie set. He snuggled up to her backside and warmed her, nibbling her neck and saying something in Spanish in her ear.

Armando’s palms swept from her thighs up under her shirt, sliding it up over her head in a very smooth move. He kneaded her breasts as she leaned her head back onto his shoulder. She liked being able to feel the steel of his massive arms and the hardness of his abs.

“You should know better than to go braless when you’re near me.”

“Note to self. Show up naked as often as possible,” she whispered as she turned, balanced her arms on his shoulders. She felt his arousal as she pressed her lower torso against him. “Now let’s have this off you,” she said as she slipped off his shirt and pressed her already-tingling breasts to his chest. She ran her hands down the sides of both their bodies, feeling the connection of her flesh against his.

Her body melted into him. His hands grasped her ass and pressed her into his groin. She slid her fingers down his waist and worked on his button fly. He let her find him inside, and she squeezed him gently, surprised to find him commando. He slid her pants down her hips while she stroked him. His jeans dropped and he removed them and his shoes quickly. He stood before her completely naked. She still had on a pair of pink lace panties.

Armando quickly kneeled and pressed her knees apart, seeking the warm, wet juncture between her legs that so desperately wanted to be kissed. He slipped his tongue under the elastic of the panties’ thin fabric and easily found her opening. With lazy movements he stroked her up and down, darting for a deep taste between long probing movements. Her quivering sex was ultrasensitive as he buried himself deeper between her legs. Her knees began to vibrate.

Still on his knees, he watched his fingers slowly remove the panties covering her. Armando sat there absorbing the sight, then began tracing one forefinger up her inner thigh until it found her folds and, with the same lazy motion, he impaled her.

Gina braced herself on his shoulders, spreading her knees wider, and then drew his head toward her belly. She squeezed the back of his neck as his fingers worked their way to fill her. The glorious feeling of his hands on her in the most intimate of ways filled her with ecstasy. He dipped his head lower, and now his tongue joined his fingers as he lapped and sucked her lips, pulling her soft tissues gently with his teeth. She felt her body lying in wait, anticipating his huge cock. A rolling orgasm took hold of her, sending her floating.

When she stopped shuddering, Armando stood and took her hand. He led her down the hallway to a light-green-colored bedroom that was sparsely decorated. The king- sized bed was covered in a black satin coverlet. A filigreed steel bedframe and footboard looked oddly feminine in the otherwise masculine room. Several hooks at the side of a closet door were filled with jackets, backpacks, pouches and straps.

He dropped her hand to spread back the coverlet. He helped her into the cool white sheets underneath. The pillows her cheeks brushed against smelled like him. Her thighs smoothed over the cotton until they found his warm legs. He moved over her as he pressed himself against her.

He handed her a foil packet. He watched her face as she sheathed him, kissing his pecs and squeezing his cock.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

“My pleasure.”

Back and forth he slowly moved his cock until his head found her. He stopped pressing and took her face in his palms, kissing her from her shoulder up to her mouth. She moved her torso up to meet him, pressing his buttocks with both hands, spreading her knees to the sides.

Armando began the rhythmic motion in and out, stroking her body with his girth, pushing deep inside until she saw stars. His long lazy strokes became more intense. She wanted him deeper. She wanted him to fill her. She needed to feel the size of him stretching and loving her insides. Gina never wanted it to end. They said not a word to each other.

The glow of their silent joining was shattered when she cried out as her body twisted and clutched under his, desperate to feel his enormous size deep inside her. She reveled in the way his strong arms held her as she arched back and gave herself to the orgasm that crashed over her. She tasted his sweat as she nipped at his shoulder, feeling the urgency of his own climax. For a few seconds he held her close to him while their bodies shuddered in unison.

She could still feel him spending inside her. It suddenly seemed important to take every bit of him he would give. She squeezed his buttocks and pressed him hard against her for those final seconds of his release.

An hour later, when she woke up to find him asleep but still inside her, she looked down at the muscled torso and smooth flesh of this warrior. She’d found some scars, as she’d loved him, things she hadn’t seen or felt in the truck the first time they had made love. He had an inner thigh wound, a scrape over his shoulder blade and a scar on his left bicep that had been mended with stitches. His chest expanded and contracted, pressing her deep inside the bed’s foam mattress and then releasing her to catch her breath. Her fingers lightly skipped along his strong upper thigh, onto the round buttock muscles that were firm as steel.

She found the scar below his right eye worrisome, as well as a long, healed slice to his right upper lip. God willing, she’d be able to kiss away those scars and in time they would heal soft as a baby’s bottom. If she kissed him enough. If he would let her tend to him, take care of him. His one arm was underneath her back, the thick fingers of his right hand grabbing for the flesh at her waist even in his sleep. He was possessive, didn’t want her to leave without him knowing.

And that made her hotter than hell, and ready for round two.

Much later, over chowder at the Crab Pit, Armando thought he’d bring up the subject of his sister. “Can I ask a favor of you?”

“Sure.”

“We’re going on a training this week. Will be gone until Friday night. I want to ask you to look after Mia while I’m away. Can you keep her out of trouble for me?”

She frowned at his request.

“I know we haven’t talked about it—”

“It’s fine.” She patted his hand. “I’d be happy to look out for her for you.”

“Thanks.” He wanted to ask more. “How did the two of you meet?”

“At Babes,” she avoided his eyes again. He knew she’d lied.

“
You
went there?”

“Why, you think I’m too good for Babes?”

“Absolutely you’re too good for Babes. Bad crowd there.”

“I can handle it,” she said. She was avoiding eye contact with him again.

“You know, I just don’t get you. You’re way too classy to get caught up with the guys who hang out there.”

She reached for his hand. “Armando, let’s not talk about it. Let’s not spoil this perfect day.”

But Armando couldn’t let it go. “Why do you go back there, to that place inside yourself? You’re not the type of girl who belongs there.”

“Oh yeah? Where do I belong, besides in your bed, of course?”

“Well, not in that cheap strip joint. I don’t know. I don’t understand you, that’s all.”

“Nothing to understand. I’m a simple gal.”

“But you could have so much. You have so much going for you, Gina. Why are you throwing your life away like this?”

She was getting annoyed. “I’m not throwing my life away. I have a great job. I found you, didn’t I?”

“Yes, but I was going to ask you not to go to that bar anymore. Those guys are dangerous, Gina.”

Her eyes glazed over. “And you’re not?”

“No, I’m—” he struggled for the words. “I’m a different kind of dangerous. Not like Carlos and those creeps.”

“I think they’re headed for a fall.”

“How would you know that?”

Gina was thoughtful and then answered. “Just a hunch. Come on, Armando, give me a little credit. Don’t you trust me?”

And there it was. He was forced to say that yes, he trusted her, to keep Mia on ice until he could figure something out. He had to trust her because there weren’t any other options.

Chapter 15

Fifty men from SEAL Team 3 stepped into the military transport and flew to an abandoned, dusty airfield somewhere in the Nevada desert. There were no structures visible for miles, but Armando knew there was a whole surveillance complex just ahead. The “buildings” looked like foothills and cattle sheds. Most of the structures were underground.

They gathered up their gear and jumped into seven unmarked dark-covered trucks. The back was open to the desert air and all they had was a hard bench to sit on.

Cooper, Fredo, Marky, Jones and Kyle all sat next to each other. Cooper and Fredo were discussing the pros and cons of married life, not that Fredo was any closer to it. Armando had to hand it to him, though. The little SEAL never stopped trying.

“The fuckin’ movers, man,” Cooper began, “mixed everything up. I went to unpack the kitchen box so at least we could prepare our first meal in the place, and found Libby’s underwear.”

Cooper caught hell for that one. Several other men from Team 3 started laughing. Leopold was a tall Mormon boy from Pennsylvania, nearly Cooper’s height. “I’d take that one as a sign. Breakfast in bed. All I’m sayin’.”

“Libby was not in the mood. She was so pissed she almost ordered me out with the movers. Like it’s somehow
my
fault.
She
labeled the fuckin’ boxes.”

“Welcome to married life, son,” Kyle said. Though they were all close to the same age, their LPO liked to dispense advice about home life and domestic harmony almost as much as Gunny.

“I believe the term you have yet to learn is,
yes, dear,
” Armando added.

“You best learn that or yo’ mamma gonna hold her knees together real tight. You got twenty years of purgatory minimum,” Jones added with a smile.

Fredo had to jump in on that one. “That’s when you get some professional advice,” he said as he stood and gyrated his hips to the sounds of oohs and ahhs from the audience.

“And then you get that damned letter from the lawyer,” one of the other men said.

They’d been driving for nearly an hour and the bench seat was getting hard. The background chatter was comfortable, working like white noise. Armando thought about his glorious morning and afternoon on Sunday with Gina, and couldn’t wait until Friday when they’d reconnect. He’d be so ready for her he got stiff just thinking about it.

“You’re kinda quiet, Armani,” Kyle said as he shoved his shoulder into him. “Everything right?”