Delta: Revenge (29 page)

“Looks like more than bruises to me.”

He shrugged.

“Why your ego?”

He tilted his head toward the room. “Want to come in?”

She nodded, and he took her hand, guiding her into a bedroom that was the size of her first apartment. “So…?”

“Need anything?” He slipped her bag off her shoulder and tossed it onto a chair.

“No.”

“I’m benched.” He shrugged, distant and dismayed. “Sucks. But I deserved it. And being the way Delta rolls, they stuck my ass here in posh and civility, under a doc’s eye, until my team leader feels interested in talking to me.” He shook his head. “And after the ass ripping I earned, I may be stuck in this palatial prison for-fuckin’-ever.”

She smiled. “Hard life.”

Javier raised his eyebrow. “You’re here.”

“I am.”

“Thanks.”

Sophia nodded. “So what happened?”

“Didn’t think.”

“Ran face-first into a blast zone?”

“Something like that.”

“Are you… okay?”

He stared then turned, walking to the French doors that opened to a balcony. She trailed behind him, never having seen him in track pants and a T-shirt. It was interesting how formidable he still seemed in a room like this and dressed like that.

They stood on the balcony overlooking thick greenery. His hand found hers, and they stayed in silence.

With a squeeze, Javier gathered her to his chest. “Thank you for being here.” His mouth dropped to her ear. “Stay?”

Tummy flipping and mind spinning, she nodded. “Of course.”

“Best medicine yet.”

Her cheeks warmed as his hands ran over her back. “How much medicine have you needed anyway? Thought it was just bumps and bruises.”

Javier’s lips found her neck. It wasn’t a kiss but more like a taste. Every doubt and uncertainty washed away as a cascade of shivers ran down her spine, rocketing all the way to her toes. Sophia sighed, leaning into him as his kiss deepened. His tongue flicked, and his lips sucked. Even the gentle scratch of his teeth felt good. “God.”

With the mumbled moan, Javier turned her. Their stomachs touched, and his hands ran down her shoulders until he interlocked their fingers. “I want to hear that again.”

“God?”

“No. That sound. That sigh. The sweetness that fell out of your lips.” Javier’s hands stayed knotted in hers, but he pressed into her. Slowly, eyes locked in a trance, he pushed until Sophia’s back hit the stucco wall.

They were in heaven, surrounded by the jungle, one of the most beautiful places on earth she’d ever seen. Yet it was Javier that had her mesmerized.

He tilted his head, turning his attention back to her neck. The gentleness of his mouth made her mind spin, but it was the strength of his body, pushing her against the grating wall, that took her by surprise. He dropped her hands, roughly running his up her arms and into her hair.

“Sophia.” He breathed against her lips, threading fingers into her hair, tugging her head back, and opening her for a kiss. His tongue delved deep; his taste was sweet. Full lips owned the kiss.

That was what she needed: him, in the middle of nowhere, no pressure. Her mind calmed under the kiss, and everything she worried about and wanted from him and was scared of—
everything
was gone.

He pulled back, still holding her tightly in his hand. “Paixão.”

Javier tugged her shirt overhead and dropped it, not wasting a second to stare. He removed her bra with the same efficiency. Exposed and aroused, they were outside in the middle of nowhere as the warmth of the sun hit her breasts.

He bent, taking her nipple into his wet, warm mouth. Tongue flicking and sucking deeply, he massaged her other mound as her head dropped back against the hard wall. With each caress, her heart skipped a beat. The sensitive flesh between her legs came alive, needing a touch as deliberate as he was doing to her chest.

“Javier,” she breathed, and it was her turn to thread fingers into his hair. Thick, lush locks filled her palms, and as she held him to her, he pulled her pants down over her hips, taking with them her panties.

“Step out, Soph.”

She did, hands still buried in his hair, bare to the world and pressed underneath a completely clothed man. Her shoes kicked to the side with the rest of her clothes, she pulled his head back, aware of how naked she was, and an exhibitionist thrill ran through her.

“Spread your legs.”

She took a shy step apart.

“Further.” He sank to his knees, dragging his hands—his tongue too—down her stomach.

God. He looked up, and she couldn’t breathe. Her alpha man, down on his knees and—shit, his fingers went between her legs, stroking her wet folds. Using an elbow, he urged her wider. “Pretty little good girl.”

Moaning, she nodded, liking how he said those words and how he appreciated her vulnerability. Javier pressed his fingers to his mouth. “You taste like mine.”

A twist in her heart exploded, and she nodded, unable to speak. Her throat had knotted, and her mind had stalled. With no more warning than a smile, he kissed her stomach and continued to stroke her slit.

“Feel good?”

“Yes.”

He spread her open and loved on her clit. “That too?”

Sophia’s head fell to the side. “
Yes.
”

His fingers dipped inside her wanting body, and damn, it’d been too long since he’d touched her like that. She moaned at the intrusion, and he took that as invitation to press deeper, surer, stronger.

Sinking lower, he licked her hip bone, trailing to the trimmed patch of hair, then swirled his tongue around her clit. Sensation overload. Javier curled his fingers just enough to make her cry out, suckling hard enough to make her writhe against the wall, scratching her back, and she did not give a damn about that bite of pain.

His wet fingers pulled out, drifted back, and teased further. Then even
further
. “
Javier.
”

The slick touch of his fingertip on her ass was more than she could handle. He nuzzled his face between her legs and circled her tight hole, which had never been touched. She shouldn’t like it. But, God, she did. It was sensitive and erotic and forbidden, like having him finger her on a balcony.

“Easy,” he whispered against her sensitized flesh.

Nodding, she whimpered, trying to be easy, to relax. Javier pushed his shoulder under her thigh and kissed her pussy. The stubble on his cheeks scratched the inside of her leg, his chin doing wonderful things to her flesh as he teased and circled his finger inside her.

“God.” Her gasp shook; her body tightened. Parts of her that had never been touched begged for more.

Javier alternated to her clit, his lips encircling, his tongue wicking, and his scratchy chin pressed against her folds. One finger teased her ass; the others slid inside her pussy. A three-front attack stormed her as she gave herself over to him. Javier pushed and pumped, licked and kissed.

“Please.” The impending climax was so good it almost hurt.

He leaned his weight into her, tilting her just right, growling against her clit. “Paixão, come for me.”

The intensity slammed. The orgasm came as one had never come before. Sensations she couldn’t get enough of and had never had before mixed with what worked so damn well, and Sophia lost her mind. “Javier!”

“There you go.” He didn’t let up, driving deeper, milking her response.

Sophia thrashed, feeling the scrape of the wall against her back. “God.”

Her body quaked, and the wave of rippling muscles ran deep. Javier’s lips and tongue gentled. His fingers did too. Even as her sensitive parts spasmed against his kiss, he worshipped between her legs, murmuring, kissing, and savoring. Everything about this man was perfect.

With the sun on her face and the warm breeze picking up, he held her, and she collapsed against him.

“
Gosto muito de você.
”

“What does that mean?”

“I am… gone for you.” He scooped her into his arms and carried her through the French doors, leaving them open for the fragrant breeze to hit the air conditioning. Her humming body rode the aftershocks in his arms as they lay in bed. Javier pulled the shirt over his head, freezing midstrip and staring. He took her wrist, delicately holding it. “What’s this?”

“A tattoo.”

“I see that. Why?”

She blinked, shyness mingling with the magical feeling that only he could create. “I wanted to see how I felt about something and looked toward the future.”

“What something?”

Sophia looked away, but Javier caught her chin. “Tell me.”

Steeling her heart, she looked at the heart leaves—the ones blowing away and the ones growing anew. “To remember you.”

“I’m here, Soph. I told you that.
I told you that.
That I want you.”

“You want two things, and
one
you should have more.”

Javier shook his head. “Sophia—”

“I didn’t do this to upset you. I did it because I wanted to always remember… you. When you go off to do your thing, and I’m doing mine. If this is supposed to happen, later…” Her new heart was blossoming on the unshakable tree. “But if it wasn’t going to happen, I wanted to always remember.”

How much I love you.

He wrapped his arms around her, hugging her as though she were his world, and curled around her body. “I haven’t slept well in days.”

That was the story of her life except when she was with him, but in his arms, her soul sighed.

Javier pressed his lips to hers, not kissing, just… touching. “Sleep with me.”

She nodded, leaning into him. Javier adjusted the pillows underneath their heads then pulled the cover from the side, not bothering to crawl underneath. Seconds later, with the brilliant light shining and the fragrant breeze rolling in, he fell asleep.

With even breaths, she replayed the last twenty-four hours: the terror, the fear, the straight chaos of worry. Those feelings had morphed into an intense need, and now, there was nowhere on earth she’d rather be.

Javier cuddled closer, waking slightly and pulling her to him. “I’m in love with you, paixão.”

Sophia’s gag reflex jump-started. One second she was staring at Javier, feeling weightless, with her mind free, able to fly in his arms with no responsibilities, no focus, nothing except him and her and the warmth bleeding between the two.

Out of nowhere, harsh feelings she hadn’t dealt with slammed her into the cold. Her mind wasn’t with Javier. It was her awful ex, ruining the moment. Every time she had said the word love had been with Josh. Not once had she thought the word
love
for Javier. That headache had been reserved for Dr. Josh, the ex she couldn’t forget.

Love you, Sophia.

Sophia. I love you.

Will you marry me, Sophia? I love you.

And she’d responded the same way every time—“I love you too”—because she thought she had loved him. The words were ruined. Her gag reflex wanted to dry heave all over Brazil knowing that phrase and sentiment had unknowingly been destroyed. Crap, she’d been so ridiculously slow to comprehend what love was.

And now
she was in love
with Javier.

She didn’t want more, just the man in front of her. She loved Javier, and the words were ruined. They wouldn’t come out of her mouth.

I love you.
It didn’t mean anything like the way she’d felt before.

“I—um—” Jesus. Physically, she couldn’t vomit the words out. She should speak! Or instead, drop to her knees and pray. Thank God that there was a man like Javier who would offer to love her, and she was a stuttering, ridiculous mess. “Javier—”

He pressed two fingers to her shaking lips. “Shh.”

“But, I—” Tears pricked her eyes.

“Sophia. Don’t say another word.”

She was ruining their moment. He must have realized it was insane to love a woman who couldn’t speak and that she was a hot mess if there ever was one. She asked for so much from him and couldn’t give him simple words.
My God!

But his smile was—wonderful. Sweet. Caring. And, damn, so sexy. Just like the accent that rolled off his tongue when he said the simplest commands.

“Please don’t hate me,” she whispered.

“Only if you say something like that again.” Javier wrapped his arms around her, pulling her to his chest. One of his hands threaded into her hair, and the other kept her clasped tight as she heard the steady, rhythmic beat of his heart.

“Javier—”

“Too soon? Too crazy?”

“No.”

“Too what?” he asked.

How to explain that a simple phrase
wasn’t good enough
to justify her feelings and that Javier wasn’t worthy of what she’d wasted on Josh?

His fingers flexed into her, and her ear pressed on the broad, muscular expanse of his chest. She pinched her eyes closed and concentrated on the steadiness thumping in her ear. The calmness. The complete assuredness of him holding a shaking, fumbling her in his thick arms while he was the one hurt, the one who needed caring.