Bourne to Love Emma (RED-Stone Operatives Book 1) (22 page)

            “Tex is right – flushing them out that way is
probably the easiest way to do it.  But I can run all this behind the scenes just
in case.  Everyone signed on at RED-Stone knowing background checks were part
of the deal, right?  Well, this is just a continuation of that…just a million
times more in-depth….”

            Emma and Heather stood up to start clearing the
dishes and John watched them leave the room before his gaze lasers in on me
again.

            “I won’t tolerate it, Bourne.  We find this
fucker and end it.  I will not let RED-Stone’s reputation – the legacy Stone
left in my care – fall to the ground because of a few greedy, disloyal fucks.”

            “Understood.  We’ll figure it out, boss.”

~Jason~

            Heather was in the middle of telling us about one
of the new waitresses at the bar when I felt Emma’s breathing change.  We were
on the loveseat in the living room and she had curled up against my chest about
half an hour ago because she was cold.  I knew it was getting late – Mia had
played on the floor with the dolls Heather keeps for her and the next thing we
knew, she was asleep with her little backside sticking up in the air and her
thumb in her mouth.  I raised my hand to catch Heather’s attention and pointed
at Emma with my eyebrows raised in question.

            Heather smiled softly and nodded.  She stood and
walked to me.  “I’ll keep Mia if you want to take Emma home.  It might be nice
for y’all to wake up without the little monkey in the morning.  Wink wink,
nudge nudge.”           

            I huffed out a laugh at her comment, but she’s
right, it’d be nice to have Emma to myself without the worries of everything
else for a little while.

            “That would be great, Heather.  Can you walk out
with me and get the door so I don’t have to wake her up?”

            John stood up and said, “I’ll help Jason if
you’ll get Mia into her bed.”  When he was right next to Heather, he leaned
close to her and continued, “and then get your sexy ass into my bed – naked.” 
I’m pretty sure he meant to say that so I couldn’t hear, but I did.  I laughed
and shook my head.

            John held the front door for me and then jogged
ahead to Emma’s car and unlocked it before pulling open the passenger side
door.  Emma stirred as I lowered her into the car and I kissed her cheek and
whispered, “It’s okay, baby, go back to sleep.”

            After shaking hands with John and saying
goodnight, I circled the car and got in.  Emma was watching me.

            “I didn’t mean to wake you up, Em.  I know you’re
exhausted.” 

            “Heather’s keeping Mia?”

            “Yeah, uh, she suggested that we might like a
morning alone without the human alarm clock….”  I suddenly felt like maybe I
overstepped making that decision.  Mia wasn’t my kid and I didn’t ask Emma
before I agreed with Heather.

            “Okay.”  Well, then.

            “Why don’t you lean your seat back and try to go
back to sleep?”

            She didn’t answer, but she didn’t lean her seat
back, either.  After a minute, she reached over and rested her hand on my
thigh.  I covered it with mine and she curled her fingers around mine and held
my hand.  It was completely quiet in the car for a long time.

            “He was going to kill me.”  This came when we were
almost halfway back to the apartment building.  It startled me enough that my
hand actually jerked the wheel just a little.

            I glanced at Emma and saw her staring forward at
the dark road ahead of us.  I honestly had no idea what to say to that, but she
wasn’t waiting for me to say anything.

            “You and John both told me to press charges and I
didn’t.  He and Heather pushed me for two days to let you take those pictures. 
You told me he was stalking me, but I still didn’t believe it.  He hurt
Heather.  He hurt me.  He could have hurt you, too.  I can’t even… can’t even
imagine what he’d have done to Mia.”

            She shifted in her seat, turning to look at me. 

            “You put yourself in harm’s way for me.  For me
and for Mia.  You took care of us and dropped everything else going on in your
life to do it.  You haven’t slept, you haven’t gone to work – you made it all
about us, even when I didn’t take it seriously.”

            “Emma –“

            “No.  Let me finish, please….  He had a gun.  If
things had gone another way, you could have gotten hurt or…killed.  Because of
me.  Because I was too naïve or oblivious or just
stupid
to see what was
happening in front of my own eyes.  But you never let it hurt me or Mia.  So, I
just wanted to say thank you.  Thank you for protecting us at great cost. 
Thank you for doing that for so many people long before I knew you – because
that’s who you are.  It’s one small part of why I love you.”

            I pulled the car to the shoulder of the road and
turned on the hazard lights so I could face her.  I cupped her chin in my palm
and stroked my thumb over her jaw.

            “Em, I love you, too.  You aren’t stupid at all. 
You are gentle and kind and sweet and you try to see the good in everyone.  You
give people the benefit of the doubt – even when they don’t deserve it. 
Because that’s who YOU are.  And I love you because of that and a million other
things.”

            I leaned in and kissed her lightly.

            “You aren’t supposed to see the danger every
day.  You aren’t supposed to see the thousand ways someone could hurt you or
con you or whatever.  That’s my job.  I spent so many years in the darkness
fighting the darkness itself.  The thing is, when it’s so dark, you don’t even
realize how dark it really is until there’s light.  That’s you, Emma.  You
walked into my life and shined light into the darkness.  The world is so much
better in the light and I never want to go back to living in the dark.  So,
thank YOU, Emma.  I may have saved you and Mia but, the truth is, you saved me
more.” 

            She struggled with her seatbelt for a second and damn
near climbed over the console between our seats to get to me, tears filling her
eyes.  She wrapped her arms around my neck and kissed every part of my face
that she could reach.  When she finally settled on my mouth, the kiss went from
sweet to nuclear blast in a heartbeat.  She slid her tongue in my mouth and
stroked the roof of my mouth and then curled it around my tongue.  Her nails
scratched the back of my head and neck, her arms pulling me tighter against
her.  She sucked my tongue, hard.

Before I lost control of myself, I
pulled back enough to rest my forehead against hers and closed my eyes.  My
pulse was pounding in my ears and in my crotch.  There was no thought cold
enough to pull that blood back out of my groin.

            “Dammit, Emma.”

            She laughed softly, the sound of her tears still
in her voice.  “You say that a lot.”

            I sighed.  “You tempt me a lot.”

            After another moment, I kissed her once more and
pushed her back toward her seat.  I waited while she buckled back in and got
settled.

            “Let’s go home, babe.”

            “I love hearing you say that.”  Her hand curled around
mine again and I knew it was exactly the right word:  home.

~Emma~

            By the time we got back to our building, we were
both dragging.  It was late and dark and Jason hadn’t slept in a few days, I’m
sure.  We held hands through the garage, up the elevator and all the way into
his bedroom.  He asked if I wanted to go back to my apartment but, without Mia,
it really didn’t matter.                      

            I used the restroom and brushed my teeth and hair
and then Jason took a turn.  When he opened the bathroom door, I was pulling my
sleep tank top on over my head.

            “Nope.  No kid, no clothes.”

            “What?” 

            “Mia isn’t here.  I want you naked in my bed,
even if we aren’t having sex.”

            I stared at him for a second before I pulled the
tank top back off and set it on the nightstand.  Then I pulled my panties down
my legs and do the same with them.  It was almost awkward to be getting
undressed and in bed without planning to have sex with him.  We’ve slept
together without sex before – but not naked….

            “Is this going to be a long-term rule or just for
tonight?”

            He looked thoughtful as he pulled his shirt over
his head and tossed it toward the hamper.

            “Long-term, I think.  As long as we’ve got the
house to ourselves, we should be naked.”

            “Hmmm” is all I said as I pulled back the covers
and moved my pillow.

            When I looked toward him as I slid into bed, my
gaze dropped to the massive erection he was sporting.  I smiled and looked him
in the eye.  “We’re not having sex, huh?”

            He did almost look embarrassed for a second. 
“Em.  You’re naked and three feet away.  I’d have to be dead not to respond to
you.”  He hit the light switch and I felt the bed dip.

            I sighed as he curled up behind me and pulled the
covers over us.  No matter what, he was always so warm.  I didn’t know if it’s
all the testosterone or the muscle mass or just Jason – but my cold feet and
hands are always ridiculously happy when he snuggles with me.

            His erection poked my lower back.  Even as I
closed my eyes and thought happily of sleep, I couldn’t help but wiggle just a little. 
He groaned and pulled me tighter against him, but his arm stayed around my
waist and he didn’t make any move to make me think he had changed his mind. 
Part of me was still considering changing his mind for him when I drifted off
to sleep.

            Hours later, when the faintest shades of morning
were falling through the curtained window, I woke up to him lifting my thigh as
he pressed into me from behind.  I sighed as my body rushed to catch up and my
mind drifted in the fog between sleep and wakefulness.

            After a moment, he pushed my leg forward and slid
his knee between mine so he was almost kneeling over me while I was still on my
side.  The angle is…different.  I looked up at him in the dim light and saw his
eyes were closed, his face was soft and relaxed.  I couldn’t help but smile. 
His eyes opened and he smiled back at me and leaned down to kiss my mouth.

            He leaned back and pushed my knee up toward my
chest and put one hand on the bed behind my back.  His right hand cupped my
breast and he pinched my nipple and pulled just enough to be sure my body was
totally paying attention.  I can feel my body catching fire. 

I reached up and stroked his chest,
dragging my fingernail across his nipple in return.  I couldn’t reach much of him
from this position, but I ran my hand over what I can. 

His strokes sped up and he ran his
hand down my side and over my hip.  He pulled my leg up and propped my ankle on
his shoulder, opening me wider for him.  He groaned in approval as he slid a
little deeper into my heat.  Trailing from my ankle down the inside of my leg,
his hand came to my center, swirling through my folds and caressing all of me. 

I moaned as he began to circle my
clit with his fingertips and I brought my hand down to hold his wrist.  Not to
control or stop, I just need to be grounded when he made me fly.  He stirred
his fingers around and around as he pressed deeper and deeper into my body.  I
could feel the flush spread from my chest up my neck and face.  God, he knows
my body so well.

He groaned and shifted forward, pushing
my leg back in front of me and leaning over me more fully, moving his hand
behind me forward for more leverage as his thrusts become harder and faster and
I knew he was getting close, too.  I sunk my nails into his wrist, now nearly
trapped by my thighs, as he rubbed over my clit and I jerked beneath him,
moaning his name.  He rubbed over me quickly, sending lightning through my body
as I climbed higher and higher, before he pinched my clit between his fingers
at the same time he sank his teeth into my shoulder.  I screamed as I catapulted
over the edge.  My body went stiff as the orgasm rushed through me.

I heard Jason groan as my clenching
walls sent him over, too.  He jerked into me over and over, pressing as deep as
he could get before he finally went still except for his heaving chest.  After
a moment, he fell behind me and dropped his arm back around my waist. 

“Fuck,” he whispered behind me.

I tried to roll to my back to see him
but he held me still, with him still inside me.  “What’s wrong?”

“Emma.  I…I didn’t use a condom.” 
Oh.  We hadn’t had that conversation. 

“I’m on birth control,” I offered.

“I get a physical every six months
for work.  This sounds so fucking false, but I promise I’ve never forgotten a
condom before.  I’ve always been careful.  And I’m clean.  I just…I just cannot
believe I fucking did that.”

I started to laugh a little and his
arm tightened around me.

“What the hell is funny about this,
Em?”

“It’s…flattering almost.  You’ve
never gotten so carried away that you slept with anyone else without remembering
a condom.  But I, Emma Parsons: technical writer, single mom, owner of at least
two dozen stretch marks and one of the least sexy women I know, made you forget
to grab one.”  I laughed again as it all sinks in a little more.

He pulled out of me and flipped me to
my back so he could see me.

“Emma, you are the sexiest woman I’ve
met in my life and somehow you get sexier every damn day.  Watching you with
Mia makes you more attractive, not less.  And those stretch marks?  They prove
that you carried that little girl in your body and kept her safe and that makes
you strong.  They’re like scars, baby.  Battle wounds.  They prove you’re a
survivor.  And that’s sexy as fuck.”  He leaned down and kissed me hard.

He pulled back and stared at me for a
minute and his expression shifted to…something.  I couldn’t tell what he was
thinking just then and I was about to ask when he shocked the heck out of me.

“Marry me, Emma.” 

I knew my shock had to show on my
face because I’d never been able to hide anything from him.

“I know it’s too soon and maybe it’s
crazy but, I love you and I love Mia.  I want to be part of her life and watch
her grow up.  I want to be her Dad.  I want to hold your hand and cheer her on
when she plays sports and hug her tight when some shithead breaks her heart.  I
want to give her a little brother to pick on and love.  I want to watch your
belly grow with our child.  I want to love you and protect you for the next
fifty years….  Marry me?  Make us a family?”

I felt the tears slip down my cheeks
as I looked up at him.

“Yes,” I whispered, my throat clogged
with emotion.

He kissed me softly over and over
before he hugged me to him and started to laugh.  I totally got it.  Our lives
were nothing alike.  Our experiences were completely different – night and
day.  But both of us had believed that we would never find this.  Not a love
this big.  Not a love this strong.  Not a love this true.

I had never been so happy to be
proven wrong about something so much in my life.