Strong Enough (Tall, Dark, and Dangerous #1)(50)

“You’re dismantling everything I’ve worked for. You’re ripping open old wounds, making me feel things I don’t want to feel. Making me think things I’ve got no business thinking.”

I don’t know whether to be insulted or flattered. I’m uncertain, unsteady as always. With Jasper, there is no steady ground. There is no predictability. Just when I think I’ve got him figured out, he throws me a curve ball.

“What the hell is going on, Jasper?”

“I didn’t want you. I didn’t ask for you.” Bitterness. I can almost taste it. I wish that it didn’t hurt me to hear it.

“I know you didn’t.”

“Then why the hell couldn’t you just leave me alone?”

“If that’s what you want, I’m sure I could find a way back to Atlanta.” My heart is aching.

His eyes search mine, furiously, frantically. “No! Absolutely not! Don’t you see?”

“Jasper, I don’t understand. What do you want me to do?”

“I want you to stay. I want you to stay and never leave.”

My shivering heart warms, heating the blood in every artery and vein throughout my body. “You do?”

“Yes, damn you! You’re the only thing I’ve wanted for as long as I can remember. And the one thing I can’t have.”

“But you can, Jasper,” I say, moving closer to him and setting my hands at his firm waist. “You can have me. I’m right here.”

The fire dies in his eyes, leaving them cool and defeated. His voice is low, sullen. “But you shouldn’t be. And you won’t be for long.”

There’s no talking him out of this, obviously, so the only thing I know to do is work around it. “Then love me while I’m here. Love me for all the tomorrows that we won’t have.”

Jasper raises his hands, running his fingers around my neck and into the hair at my nape. “I’ll love you for today. That’s all I can give you.”

“Then love me for today.”

When his lips take mine, they’re gentler than they’ve ever been, but also more fierce. The rage, the roughness is still there, but it’s tightly controlled. Like he doesn’t want to hurt me.

It only makes me wonder if he’s certain that he’s going to. And what that might mean for me.

—

The phone ringing stirs me from my drowsy rest on Jasper’s chest. We are in the spacious master bedroom, in a bed that’s hard as a rock, but I couldn’t care less. My bones are like butter and my brain like mush.

Jasper shifts me enough that he can stretch for his phone. I can tell by the muffled chirp that it’s probably still in the pocket of his pants, which are now in a heap on the floor. Where he left them when he tore out of them to get to me.

I smile just thinking about it. He’s as fierce in his lovemaking as he is in every other area of life. I didn’t see it before. I saw this calm, cool, collected, even aloof man who showed no emotion. He still doesn’t show very much, but I’ve learned where to look for it. It’s there. He burns as hot on the inside as I do, just in a different way.

“What is it?” he says as he rolls back into bed.

I watch his face as he listens. It shows nothing. But I notice that when I scrape my fingernails up his stomach, his nipples pucker and chills spread over his chest. When I bend to lave one with my tongue, I feel his hand at the back of my head, urging my face up to his. His pupils are so big his eyes look black. He’s turned on, but he doesn’t want to be right now, hence the single shake of his dark head.

I stick my tongue out at him pluckily and I squeak when he grabs it between his thumb and forefinger.

“Uh-huh,” he says into the phone, still holding my tongue. Just to be obtuse, rather than trying to free it, I move toward him, taking his fingers into my mouth and sucking on them. His eyes are locked on my lips, ever darkening in his increasing desire. I love that look. I love his chameleon eyes that tell me so much of what he’s feeling even when he doesn’t want me to know.

Finally he releases my tongue and slowly withdraws his fingers. His gaze is still on my mouth as he rubs his thumb back and forth over my wet bottom lip, slowly, sweetly. Almost sadly, I see, when his eyes flip up to mine.

What is he hearing that would make him sad all of a sudden?

“Fine. I’ll be in touch. Give me until tomorrow.”

When Jasper hangs up, he tosses the phone aside, but remains stretched slightly away from me.

“Who was that?” I ask, only half expecting an answer.

“The Colonel.”

I lever myself up off his chest. “What did he say?”

“He got what I needed.”

“So what does that mean?”

He doesn’t really have to answer me. I can see it all over his face that it’s nothing I want to hear.

“It means that I’ll take you to him tomorrow. It means that this will all be over soon.”





TWENTY-SIX


Jasper

I left Muse to shower. I wanted to be in there with her, but I can’t think as clearly when she’s around, much less when she’s wet and naked. That’s why I’m in the front yard, keeping a distance from her.

The time is at hand and for the first time since I left home all those years ago, I’m pausing. Hesitating. Considering not doing my job, not doing what I’m told. I let someone get too close. I got too close. Too familiar. I let myself feel and now it’s come to this. She doesn’t know it yet, but the day I walked into the little shop where she works, Muse’s life changed forever. It was never going to be the same from that day on. She just didn’t know it.