but too fried to care. Some we rescued. We found the senator’s daughter, Lisa, and a few others. A bunch more. A dozen white girls, too many local girls to count. We got our target out. But we lost Dozens, Zane, Benny, Nancy. Blake almost didn’t make it. I almost didn’t make it. Took shrapnel to the knee, ended my career. Shredded my knee bad enough that I couldn’t keep up, even after I healed. But we got the girls out, and we took out their operation.
“Shitty thing is, even though we killed—god, fucking dozens of guys, it wasn’t enough. They came back. Started over, hired more, moved their ops to somewhere else. Cervantes, man. He’s the one.” Stone realized he was gripping Wren’s arm too hard and forced himself to relax his hand. “All that, for one girl. Four of the best SEALs in the entire Navy, dead. They knew going in, every mission, it might be the last one. We all knew it. Wasn’t the first time we’d lost guys. But…it was different. We all had sisters, girlfriends, wives, moms, friends, and when you see the pictures of the girls with ribs showing, beaten bloody, track marks on their arms, sold like fucking meat and killed, floating face down in the river…you’ll do whatever you have to. It wasn’t about Lisa Johnson. Not entirely. And then this stupid church and their goddamned idiotic mission trip. Save the prostitutes for Jesus. How goddamn stupid can you be? I tried to tell them. Build houses for Jesus. Feed the hungry, bring medicine, penicillin, water. Fuck, bring empty water bottles so they can have light. They fill these empty bottles with water and a little bleach, cut a hole in the ceiling and hang the bottle into the room, the sun shines through and it’s free light. Fucking genius, really. But no, those holy-ass elders wanted to do something bigger. Nick meant well, but he’s never left Virginia, he had no idea what he was planning, what he was getting you kids into. And it happened. And now I’ve got more blood on my hands. I’ve got Cervantes and his entire fucking operation on my ass, and all I’ve got is one pistol and my bare hands. This is the guy who managed to ambush US Navy SEALs, and I’ve got no back up. No extraction zone. No chopper waiting for me.”
Wren curled her hand around the back of his neck, pressed her forehead to his. “But you’re not alone. Just like I’m not alone. We’re in this together. I know I’m not a Navy SEAL, but…I’m here with you.”
Stone dragged in a shuddering breath and blew it out. “Babe, you’re as tough as any SEAL I’ve ever known. I don’t know many trained, battle-hardened soldiers who could have endured what you have.” He kissed her temple, softly, slowly. “And you’re sexy as hell, to boot.”
“Not like this, I’m not. I’m a mess.”
“Shower again?”
Wren nodded, then he saw her forehead wrinkle in a frown. “I’m not sure I can, though. It hurts. My side hurts. I’m…weak. Hot, and then cold. Achy.”
Stone brushed her hair away from her eyes. “Together, then. I’ll help you.”
Wren grinned, a smile equal parts shy and eager. “You’ll help me?” A lift of her eyebrow turned it into an innuendo.
Stone narrowed his eyes. “Help you get clean. How can you think that way at a time like this?”
“How can I not? I’m naked, you’re naked. I may feel like shit, but I’m not dead.”
Stone scooted toward the edge of the bed, holding on to Wren, helping her into the bathroom. He reached in to the shower stall and turned on the water, adjusting the temperature until it was hot. He nearly yelped when he felt Wren’s hand skate across his ass, a soft touch. He glanced down at her, and she managed to keep an innocent expression on her face even as she palmed his left ass cheek, and then his right. He felt himself responding, hardening.
He tried to think about anything other than her hand on his skin, but it was impossible. Especially when she pushed to her feet and stood so she was pressed against him from behind, her breasts on his back, her hand on his ass, now sliding around his hip and brushing his stomach. He stepped into the shower, grabbing her wandering hand and pulling her in after him. The water was almost too hot, but perfectly so, sluicing over her hair and down her chest, between her breasts, over her thighs. She was upright on her own, despite her words. But then he felt her shake, felt her knees give. He turned with her and set her on the seat in the corner of the shower, adjusted the shower head so the water soaked her.
Standing in front of her, he opened the shampoo, dumped some on her scalp. Wren closed her eyes and held on to his waist as he massaged the shampoo into her hair, working it down to the tips. When she was lathered, he helped her stand up and rinsed her hair until it was clean once more. Then the conditioner, gobs of it smeared into her thick black hair, working it in from scalp to tips and back again. Then he massaged her scalp with his fingertips, reveling in the blissful expression on her face, the way she sighed in pleasure. Leaving the conditioner to set, he scrubbed a washcloth with soap until it lathered, and then held Wren against his chest, her front to his, forcing his thoughts away from where he’d like to touch her and the sounds he wanted her to make, focusing on scrubbing her dark skin with the soapy white cloth. Her washed her all over, shoulders, arms, back, crouching to scrub her thighs and calves and feet, the water beating on his head like hot rain. Then he turned her to lean back against him and washed her breastbone, between her breasts. As gently as he could, he ran the washcloth over the soft, heavy globes of her full breasts, reverently, tenderly.
When he moved the washcloth away, Wren took it from him, dropped it to the floor of the shower and took his hands in hers, moved them back to her breasts.
“Touch me, Stone.” She moved one of his hands down her belly, between her thighs. “Touch me here.”
All this time, Stone had nearly forgotten his own injury. He was reminded when he shifted in place, letting her weight sag against him as he obliged her request, indulging in his own desires. Pain screamed through him, but he ignored it, shifted her weight away just enough to ease the ache. His hands roamed her body, sliding over her soap-slick skin, feeling her nipples harden under his palms as he grazed her boobs with his hands, cupping their weight. Between her thighs, to the heat there, his fingers finding her softness ready for his touch. She moaned when he slid two fingers inside her. She wrapped one arm up over her head to cup his neck, and he bent his head to kiss her shoulder as he found her most sensitive places, found the ways she loved to be touched and brought her to climax, let her fall away from the edge and back up again.
He sat down and moved gingerly to his knees, tugged her bottom forward and nudged her knees aside.
“Stone? What…what are you doing?”
“This.” He kissed the down-soft skin of her inner thigh, then again closer to her core. She sucked in a breath and held it as he licked at her opening, and he held his own breath as his side protested. The ache was nothing to the pleasure of hearing her moan as his tongue flicked against her slick wetness. He licked again, and Wren pressed toward him, seeking more. He gave her more, found her clit and sucked it into his mouth, suckled it until she couldn’t hold back the moans. She leaned back against the wall, moaning, lifting her hips, pressing her opening to his mouth. He slid his hand beneath her ass and lifted her, lapped her sweetness, set her down and slid a finger inside her, curling to find the perfect spot, high inside, making her groan low in her throat, animalistic sounds of raw pleasure.
She came suddenly, arching up and groaning, holding his head in her hands and pressing him against her. “Stone…oh god, Stone!”
He didn’t relent as she came, but increased his pace, licked and suckled and fingered her faster until she pushed him away, gasping and limp in the stream of water. “You’re so beautiful,” he murmured, rising to his feet. “You’re so sexy when you come.”
She gazed up at him from beneath hooded eyes. “You make me feel things I didn’t know were possible.”
“Good.”
She reached for him, the tightening at the corner of her eyes revealing the ache of movement. Neither of them would let the pain get the better of them. He stood in front of her, let her touch him. She grasped him in her fist, the water on his back now, and her eyes roamed from his face to his chest, to her hand around him. She took him in both hands, slid her fists around him. A smirk crossed her lips, and then she bent her head and pulled him closer, took him in her mouth. He gasped, groaning as the hot wetness of her mouth surrounded him, the sharp tug of pleasure filling him as she moved her mouth up and down, then licked him, worked the base of him with her hands.
A few moments more, watching her take him in her mouth, and then he pulled her up and carried her out of the shower, set her on the bed, both of them dripping wet. He shut off the water and returned, found her waiting, watching. She reached for him as he crawled across the bed toward her, grasped his aching erection in her fist and guided him into her, curling her arm around his neck and murmuring his name as he slid deep.
