Forged in Smoke (Red-Hot SEALs #3)(112)

Maybe not, but at least she’d have had a f*cking childhood.

He forced back the anger. That wasn’t what she needed right now. She needed someone to hold her and listen.

“Dr. Benton was the first person in my life who didn’t treat me like a walking casualty. Who didn’t assess me by my transplants or tachycardia or lowered immune system. He was the first person who saw the whole me. Faith. The good, the bad, the ordinary.”

“That’s why you joined his research team after college?” Rawls prompted, hoping to keep her talking.

He’d bet this kind of openness, this kind of vulnerability, was new to Faith. Her guard was down, but who knew how long that would last, and he wanted to know more about her. Everything about her.

“Maybe . . . but I still loved it. There was always something new to learn or study or do. It didn’t feel like work, so I stayed late most nights and got there early. Everyone did.”

“What you’re describin’ is life on the teams.” He paused, laughed softly. “My team, that is. We train together, work together, and play together. They’re my teammates, but my friends too.”

He could feel her thinking that through—thinking that he still had his friends, while hers were gone.

“You still have friends, Faith,” he reminded her softly. “New friends. You have Kait, Beth, Zane, and Cosky. You have me.”

Did she hear the promise in his voice?

She stirred restlessly against him. “It’s not the same thing. I barely know them. I thought Kait was a charlatan, for God’s sake.”

Rawls smiled in satisfaction. Thought . . . past tense again.

“There’s plenty of time to get to know them. We’ll be hangin’ out with them a lot.”

She obviously noticed the way he’d linked them because her hand slipped around his hip and wrapped around his dick.

“So we’re friends?” she asked, without a hint of coyness.

He tried to concentrate on the curiosity in her voice—but sweet Jesus—he could barely string two thoughts together with the way her soft, hot hand was burning around his cock.

“That we are.” His voice sounded strangled.

“Then what is this?” She pumped her hand up and down his cock before giving it a light squeeze. “Friends with benefits?”

“Hell no!” He caught her hand, easing it from his dick. “This is a committed relationship. The kind where if another man tries to touch you, I break every bone in his body.”

She must have liked that announcement because her body melted into his. “What if another woman touches you?”

He shrugged and stroked a long, slow hand up her abdomen to cup her breast. “Then you can break every bone in my body.”

She snorted out a laugh. Leaning down, she kissed the arm locked around her waist. “I don’t mind . . . you know . . .” She wiggled her ass against his crotch. “Doing it, if you want to.”

He chuckled. Doing it? Look at her getting all bashful.

“Lovemakin’ can wait,” he said, knowing she could feel the missile pressing against her hip.

“But doesn’t it hurt?” Her hand closed over the rigid length of his shaft.

She sounded more inquisitive than worried, as though her scientific curiosity was getting the better of her.

“It’s not exactly pleasant,” he said dryly. “But there are plenty of things that hurt a hell of a lot more.”

Like losing her in the tunnels. Absently, his arm tightened around her waist, sealing her against him until he could feel every breath she took and every beat of her heart.

The fact that she didn’t protest told him his instincts were right. She needed cuddling tonight. The heat could come later.





* * *





Chapter Twenty-Three




* * *





FAITH AWOKE TO a furnace roasting her backside from shoulders to toes. Dazed with sleep, she tried to wiggle away, but the band of steel wrapped around her waist tightened, dragging her flush against the heater again. Vaguely the sound of breathing registered and her memory stirred.

The vise around her waist was a male arm. A heavy male arm. The furnace against her back, a long, lean male body. The bulge nudging her bottom, either a hip or a knee or . . . something else entirely . . .

Rawls.

She squirmed back a few inches and snuggled down, contentment spreading through her in a warm, fluffy wave. It felt so good to have him wrapped around her like this. So . . . right.

But then the memory of the night before crashed into her mind. The forest, the explosion. Her friends and colleagues dead. All dead. Grief rose, drowned the contentment beneath a whirlpool of loss. So much death. So much evil.

She concentrated on the furnace toasting her from behind until the hollow raw grief eased. She wasn’t going to give the bastards who’d stolen her friends the satisfaction of destroying her life as well. There was proof of life behind her. Proof of good, rather than evil. She’d focus on what was important. What really mattered—like life and friendship and love.

Love?

The realization snapped her fully awake. Fully aware.

She loved him?

Well, sure she was attracted to him, but when had that physical attraction morphed into an emotional connection?