Page 33 of My Forbidden Commander

I should be relieved. Instead, I’m pacing the length of my hut in the middle of the night, four steps one way, four steps back.

Maybe it was just a game to him. Maybe he wanted to prove to himself that he could bring a full colonel with two decades of discipline to his knees—not literally, God, not that I haven’t fantasized about that. But maybe he got what he wanted. The reaction. The evidence. And now he’s moved on, and I’m the one replaying the encounter in my head, night after night.

I stop pacing and press the heel of my hand against my sternum like that’ll do something for the ache underneath. Forty-five years old, and I’m heartsick over a twenty-three-year-old who probably forgot my first name by breakfast.

The knock comes at 0110 exactly. Two soft raps. I freeze mid-stride, my muscles going rigid. Nobody knocks on my door at this hour with good news. Okafor. It has to be Okafor, a casualty report, patrol gone sideways.

I cross the room and open the door, already bracing for bad news.

It’s Reyes.

He’s in his fatigue pants and a plain shirt, no jacket despite the cold, his hair a mess like he’s been running his hands through it. His eyes hold mine, and my heart does something stupid.

“Specialist.” I keep my voice down. “Why aren’t you in your bunk?”

“Can I come in?” he asks quietly.

I narrow my eyes. “That’s not appropriate.”

“Would you rather I say what I have to say out here?” He tips his head toward the row of huts behind him. One of which belongs to Okafor. “Loud enough for the neighbors?”

I clench my jaw, then glance past him at the dark, checking that we’re alone, and hating myself that he’s right. Even more so that a part of me is happy that he knocked.

I step back and let him in.

Reyes moves past me and takes in my modest quarters—cot, footlocker, a desk with a lantern, my own small bathroom—and I shut the door behind him with a quiet click.

He faces me, arms crossed, chin up. “Why have you been avoiding me?” he demands without preamble.

I look at him for a long moment before I answer, collecting myself.

“Do you realize,” I finally say, “that this is the first conversation we’ve had that isn’t about PT, or patrol, or a range card? Why would you think you’re owed my attention, Specialist?”

Something moves behind his eyes. Maybe hurt, maybe something deeper, darker. He closes the distance between us until we’re chest to chest, sharing the same air. I can feel his heat, just like I did behind that deadfall on the Velin approach, just like I did in the latrine.

“Because I’ve had your dick in my hand,” he hisses, “and you came moaning my name.”

I feel a muscle tick in my cheek. “I’m not gay,” I say with finality. Like that’s the end of the dilemma.

Reyes’s mouth curves, slow and merciless. “Your dick sure thinks you are.”

Heat floods up my neck into my face, and for one second I’m not sure if I’m about to shove him out the door or put my fist through the wall behind his head. My hands make the decision before my brain catches up. I grab a fistful of his shirt and pull him in. Reyes blinks, his expression changing, a flicker of genuine fear darkening his eyes.

Good. Let him be afraid. I’m terrified too.

Then I pull him the rest of the way in and crush my mouth against his.

Reyes moans into my mouth, and it breaks something inside me wide open. I groan and haul him closer, my hand fisted in the back of his shirt, and our bodies collide with a friction that can’t be legal. I’m hard, grinding against him without meaning to, my hips finding his like they’ve done this a thousand times in the dark. He’s solid against me, warm through two layers of cotton, and my cock throbs against the ridge of his like it’s been dying to for weeks.

I’m kissing a man. I’m kissing Reyes.

The realization should stop me. It does the opposite. I noticed that mouth on day one, and some long-buried part of me wanted this since the second he tipped his chin up and said yes sir like a challenge. Now that mouth is under mine, and I can’t get enough of it.

Reyes takes over before I can catch my breath. His hands slide down my back and grab two fistfuls of my ass, dragging me in until there’s no air left between us. He angles his head and kisses down my jaw, open-mouthed, slow, sensual. My skull empties of every thought.

“Noah…”

I don’t even know I’ve said his name until it’s already out.