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“Are you really leaving tomorrow?” he asked.
She nodded. “I’ve already packed.”
He cocked his head and searched her eyes. “I’ve been trying to leave for weeks.”
“Why don’t you?”
“The bear has territory set up. He won’t leave it.”
“Ever?” she asked.
He shook his head. “I’m stuck.”
She inhaled deeply and looked over the edge of the ledge where he used to work. He’d set fire to his old life, and what a suffocating feeling to be stuck like this in the chaos he created. Maybe it was just. Perhaps it was fair, but she felt for him. She wished it was different.
She straightened her spine, and couldn’t believe she was about to say what she was thinking.
“My offer stands.”
“Offer,” he repeated softly.
“I’ve never had a one-night stand. I’m feeling reckless. I’ve never been this transparent with anyone in my entire life. I’m on birth control. There will be no strings attached. I won’t ask for more than you can give. I won’t need attention afterward.”
He lifted his chin higher into the air. “What’s in it for you then?”
“You can make me forget everything for a little while, can’t you?”
There were three breaths—each staring at the other, lost in consideration—before Gunner slid his big, strong hand around hers and led her toward the big machine.
She had a moment of panic as her brain caught up to what she’d done. She’d asked for a one-night stand that wouldn’t mean anything past tonight. She’d asked a stranger to quiet her mind from the stupid flashbacks that had been tickling her mind since he’d pointed out her broken nose.
She’d asked for an escape, and he was going to give it to her.
Her dark hero.
He climbed up onto the track of the huge machine, opened the door, helped her up inside, and scooted the seat back as far as it would go as she slid her leg over his and straddled his lap.
“First one-night stand,” he murmured, searching her eyes.
“Yes. Be gentle.”
He slid his hand around her throat, and she tilted her chin back and smiled down at him. His wicked grin met hers. “You want it gentle? You sure?”
“I want it however you think I need it.”
“Oooh, little human,” he rumbled next to her ear as he pulled her in by her throat. “All you have to do is exist now. I’ll make you forget it all.”
Hallie rolled her eyes closed at how good that sounded. His lips pressed to her neck and she scooted up, rested right against his cock—swollen and hard against the seam of his jeans. Biting her lip, she eased back and pulled his shirt up and over his head. He was all muscle, and a crisscross of scars across his torso that said he was comfortable with war. She ran her hands through his hair and he arched his head back, exposing his Adam’s apple to her kiss. He rolled his hips as he gripped hers and pulled her against him.
He was smooth with how he slid his hands up her shirt and peeled the hoodie and tank top off as one. All that remained was the black lace bra she’d thrown on before she went to that bar in hopes of getting to talk to him again. His body moved like water against hers as he sat up straighter and pulled her tight against him. His pounding heartbeat went straight through her, and she reveled in the fact that she could affect a man like him.
She’d never felt more beautiful than in this moment in the dim moonlight, with a man in a moment that no one else would ever have to know about.
In this world, they were the only ones who existed.
She moved with him as his hands dragged her this way and that, massaging her, exploring her skin.
The snap of her bra dragged shivers up her spine, and that first feel of his strong hands cupping her bare breasts made her inhale sharply and close her eyes to the world.
