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TWENTY-SIX
jax
I survived Ranger training. Deployments that could have easily seen me coming back home in a body bag. The possibility of death was just something you either had to reconcile with or lose your fucking mind.
And yet, as I waited for the sound of Natalie’s car making its way down the gravel driveway behind me, it was a special kind of torture. I could handle ruck marches and an insane operational tempo, but not texting Natalie to ask what time she would be here since it was well past nine o’clock was taking some superhuman restraint.
I hadn’t stopped thinking about her, about the land, about a possible relationship with her, for even a second these past few days. Which was how I knew, if Sicily wasn’t the number one fucking clue, I was in deeper than I’d ever been before.
Fucking finally.
The crunch of gravel from her car stopped. Silence. Until the sound of her footsteps was followed by a flash of blue. She wore jeans and a navy sweater. Natalie looked good in navy. And jeans. Hell, the woman looked good in everything.
Our eyes met as she bounded up the stairs. When she stopped at the top, I realized the problem. I’d give it to her, Natalie would make one hell of a Ranger. The restraint it must have taken her to stop halfway to me wasn’t the kind of discipline I had, and objectively I could admit my unit and I were some of the most disciplined guys on the planet. We had to be.
“Goddamn it, Natalie. We’re on another pause.”
Closing the distance between us, I grabbed her cheeks when she got close enough and held Natalie’s head as I kissed her.
And kissed her.
I couldn’t stop. Didn’t want to stop.
Her hands wrapped around my neck, and I continued to hold her to me. Her cheeks were warm beneath my fingers. Her mouth, even warmer. She tasted like mint and spring and...no.
I pulled away.
“What’s wrong?”
She tasted like love.
“Nothing. It’s just really good to see you.” I dropped my hands.
“It’s good to see you too. Thanks for the pause,” she said, backing away. “But maybe we should talk.” Natalie lifted a bag up. “Sorry I’m late. Brought donuts.”
Those cinnamon donuts were going to kill me if Natalie didn’t. I followed her into the kitchen as she headed straight for the coffee machine.
“Top me off?” I asked, putting my mug in front of her as Natalie finished pouring her own coffee.
With two full mugs and a bag of Devine’s cinnamon donuts, we headed back onto the porch. It took a healthy dose of discipline not to pull Natalie from her seat and carry her to my bedroom.
The only thing that stopped me?
I had a meeting tomorrow with Dave to finalize the sale. We had to figure this out, today.
“How was the rest of the flight?”
“Uneventful,” she said. “Jet lag is a bitch. I zonked about an hour after getting home and then woke up at four.”
“You should have come over earlier.”
“At four a.m.?”
“Sure. Why not?”
There were a few reasons we could both think of, and those needed to be dispensed with. Pronto.
“Nat,” I started. “We’ve got to figure this out.”
