CrossMyHeart Page 4

  “You poach the eggs and put them on top when you’re ready to serve it.”

  She arched a brow. “Who knew cops were like firemen and could cook? You could probably get a cooking show gig.”

  “Yeah, the Expired-Can Gourmet,” he offered with a grin. “My mom taught me to cook. If she hadn’t, she would have spent all her time at the stove when I was a teenager because I ate like a horse.” He shrugged. “A lot of cops end up single for one reason or another and we don’t all live on donuts and takeout pizza.”

  “I never had a problem with your job. I’m not stupid. I knew it was dangerous but I’ve always trusted you to know what you’re doing.”

  “That’s one of the reasons I was so sure we’d make it,” he said, after he thought for two seconds about not saying it.

  “I thought it would work both ways, which is why I thought so too,” she said and set her half-full cup on the counter.

  “I’ve never doubted your abilities,” he said and broke three eggs into a skillet of boiling water.

  “No, you just pointed out that I wouldn’t get so many threats if I wasn’t telling everyone what I thought. I started doubting myself and blaming you. It wasn’t fair but I think I was feeling vulnerable and using any excuse to step back from what was happening between us.”

  “Why were you feeling vulnerable?” When she didn’t answer he glanced over as she leaned against the doorjamb and took a deep breath. It was almost painful to watch her search for the right words but he knew she’d found them when she crossed her arms over her middle.

  “When you asked me to marry you, I panicked. All we’d been doing was fighting or fucking or trying to stay out of each other’s way. I was so exhausted that I was afraid I’d be tempted to become something I wasn’t and end up hating both of us.”

  “I didn’t really want you to change. I just wanted to know that you were safe,” he said softly.

  She hesitated for a minute, running her finger around the rim of her cup. “Tell me that I didn’t cost you your last promotion.”

  “That wasn’t your fault,” he snapped, returning his attention to dividing the hash onto two plates and sliding the eggs on top.

  “When will it become my fault? How many promotions would you have to lose before you admitted that I might be the reason? And what would I be willing to do to make sure that didn’t happen?” She shook her head. “I’ve seen too many women change to accommodate their partners. And I’ve seen the resentment it causes fester into something so ugly that I’ve sworn never to go there.”

  “Were you planning on breaking up before I asked you to marry me?”

  “No,” she admitted. “I kept trying to figure out how to stay with you without screwing up your life. Or mine.”

  She took the plate he handed her and walked into her vandalized dining room and set it on the spray-painted table. Jack followed, looping his leg over the seat as he had a hundred times before and caught an expression she tried to hide. She had missed him.

  “I rescind my marriage proposal,” he said calmly before he forked up a wedge of hash. “If you want to get married, you’ll have to do the asking.” I’ll fucking wait you out if it takes forever.

  Valentine watched as the old macho Jack surfaced. There was a determined edge in his voice and a familiar tight set to his jaw. “Really?” she asked.

  He nodded, probably because he couldn’t get a word past his clenched lips. “This doesn’t need to be a contest with a winner and a loser all clearly defined. I just don’t want to spend another six months without you.”

  And what will be different this time?

  He narrowed his eyes. “You’re overthinking this.”

  “And the only time I’m not thinking is when we’re having incredible sex. That doesn’t seem to have changed.”

  His smile was tentative. “Are you saying that I have to get you naked to get rid of those frown lines? Because I’m more than ready to do my part and in case you haven’t noticed there hasn’t been any door-slamming or silently passing each other in the hall. I wish we would have talked this out six months ago but maybe all I would have heard then was that you were making an unfair comparison and we would have ended the same way.”

  She opened her mouth and he shook his head.

  “Let me finish. I don’t think either of us was listening to the other one. I thought getting married would show you that I wanted to be with you forever, that I wasn’t leaving, and then I left instead of trying to work out why you wouldn’t marry me.”

  “Yes, you did, but I didn’t try to stop you. I’m still worried that I’m going to wake up and realize that maybe this is happening because you’re afraid someone is after me and when it’s over we’ll be back at square one.

  “This feels a bit like the old days but it’s also a bit as if we’re starting over. Can we just take what’s happening one day at a time?” she asked.

  “As long as you don’t have a problem with me staying. At least until we figure out who kicked in your door.”

  “I don’t have a problem with that,” she said with a smile and gingerly poked at her egg with the edge of her fork. “And I’m asking this just in case I ever attempt to re-create this recipe, you understand—how come the eggs aren’t runny?”

  He breathed a sigh and his lips twitched to one side. “I was distracted and cooked them too long.”

  “And I wasn’t even wearing cowboy boots,” she quipped, reveling at how easy it was to fall back into a familiar pattern.

  “Where are your cowboy boots?” he asked and his eyes darkened as the corner of his mouth slid into a grin.

  “At the back of my closet,” she said. “I haven’t worn them in a long time.”

  “You might want to dust them off.”

  “First you’re giving me cooking instructions and now you want me to brush up on my housekeeping skills,” she said, shaking her head in mock horror.

  Valentine forked up a healthy slice of hash and egg, and wondered how much of his terrible coffee she was going to have to swallow to wash her food down. At this point she was willing to drink the rest of the pot. Well, maybe not.

  “I tell you what. Whoever gets up first can make coffee but then they have to put it in a thermos so the next person doesn’t have to gag and pretend they enjoy drinking coffee-flavored water or sludge.”

  His lips twitched. “Nice solution. We can try it later—maybe after we find the boots.”

  He didn’t seem to mind that she didn’t want to waste time searching for a pair of red cowboy boots or gathering up the paper plates. Or washing the dishes. She hadn’t put a bra on under her sweater and her nipples had puckered when he mentioned the boots.

  She’d forgotten them the moment he reached across the table and grabbed the back of her head, drew her close and kissed her. He’d kissed her, stumbling down the short narrow hall on their way to the bedroom, stopping in the middle to unbutton his shirt while their tongues tangled and she held onto any body part from which he wasn’t removing clothing.

  She smiled against his mouth and ran her fingers through his crisp mat of dark chest hair before she lowered her head and latched onto a nipple, circling it with her tongue before drawing it deeper.

  His eyes closed the moment she tunneled her fingers beneath the waistband of his jeans and popped the top button. He flinched each time she eased another button out and brushed against his cock.

  He’d forgone underwear but his erection was trapped by the denim and she licked the warm flesh with the flat of her tongue. He groaned and canted his hips when she reached inside his jeans and wrapped her fingers around his cock.

  Plump and firm, it unfurled in her hands and she swiped a drop of pre-cum from the tip before she closed her lips around the head and sucked the tender knob of flesh just inside her mouth before easing it deeper.

  “Bed,” he gasped when she burrowed into the gap of his pants and drew out his balls.

  She laughed around a mouthful of warm, eager p
enis that strained against her tongue. Easing back, she came off just enough to slick her hand around the base and add a swivel to her upstroke.

  He went up on his toes in the narrow hallway and looked as if he were trying to push apart the walls. She took advantage of his position and pulled his pants to his knees, freeing his erection but leaving him trapped. The familiar was once again new as she sucked him as far back as she could take him and palmed his balls while she pumped his cock.

  The cords of his neck were strained and sweat trickled in rivulets down over his chest, dampening the hair that arrowed down to the treasure she held in her mouth. “I’m going to come if you don’t stop. Is that what you want?”

  She nodded and a thrill shot through her when his eyes glazed, hot and bright.

  “Not without you,” he whispered as he lowered himself and reached for her. She smiled and let his cock slip free before he swept her off the floor and into his arms. “Too many times without you,” he grumbled, but he was kissing her and she was giggling when he rolled her onto the bed.

  He narrowed his eyes, his gaze hotter than it had been only moments before. “Alone,” he said, as if it were important. As if she hadn’t already guessed.

  “Me too,” she said, around the lump in her throat. She leaned over and opened the drawer in the nightstand.

  He reached for the little foil packet and she batted his hand away. “I’ve missed this,” she whispered and slowly ripped it open and went up on her knees. “I’m out of practice but let’s see if I remember,” she said and used the tip of her tongue to pop the condom into her mouth.

  “When did you develop a mean streak?” he asked, and his sigh turned harsh and desperate when she palmed his sac.

  Using her free hand, she guided his very impressive erection toward her mouth and closed her lips around the satiny cock head and rolled the condom down. She smiled because she couldn’t very well talk with her mouth full and this was no time to be rude. Or mean.

  He jerked her sweater over her head as soon as she released him, laughing as he unzipped her jeans and pulled them down over her hips, her legs.

  “You could give lessons on interrogation techniques. Men would tell you anything,” he said as her socks came off with everything else.

  “Tell me again that this isn’t a mistake, that we’re not going to wake up one day and decide that all we have is this,” she asked. Knowing that even if he thought it was, she didn’t want to give up their ice-bound time together. She reached for him.

  “Don’t think—feel,” he said, already following her down. Stretching over her, wrapping his arms around her. “But for what it’s worth, I don’t think we’re a mistake.”

  She reached between them because he wouldn’t let go of her and closed her hand around his sheathed erection, guided him until he parted her slick folds and slid inside her. Wrapping her legs around his hips, she just held on, curling her hips to meet his thrust while he kissed her and the pressure inside her built as her muscles gathered and her blood quickened. His last thrust slid over a tight bundle of nerves and her orgasm drew a scream from deep inside of her that accompanied his roar.

  And then he started to speak, promising to always kiss her before he felt her up and she tried to disguise her tears with laughter. She knew she was caught when he caught the salty drops with the tip of his tongue and kissed back up the path they had taken.

  She brushed over his shadowed cheekbones with her fingertips and kissed each one before she touched her mouth to his. She didn’t want to talk. They’d been here before and had to face their regrets but she didn’t want to think about that now. She just wanted to feel.

  She woke twice in the night with Jack wrapped around her, murmuring in her ear before he started kissing her, his mouth hot and warm. And just desperate enough to remind her that this might be temporary. She woke him before dawn by easing his cock into her mouth and listening to him groan while she licked and sucked him until his hips bucked and he came with a roar.

  Chapter Four

  Valentine woke to the sounds of furniture being scraped across wooden floors and murmuring male voices. Emmett was here? Stocky and blond, he’d always reminded Val of someone who would look perfectly natural kicking back with a rum-and-pineapple drink on a beach, wearing flowered shorts and looking for the perfect wave.

  She threw on her sweats, fluffed her hair with her fingers and brushed her teeth before venturing into the dining room. It was as far as she could get with the settee and recliner blocking it off from the living room where Jack and Emmett were unrolling a thick blue vinyl-covered mat.

  “Am I going to need coffee for this?”

  Both men looked up but only Emmett grinned. “Hey, Val, I heard you’re still pissing people off.” That earned him a scowl from Jack.

  “Yeah, I hear you’ve been doing a pretty good job in that department lately. Have you figured out why your snitch set you up?”

  “Nope, time was when I bought a snitch, he’d stay bought. I don’t know what the world’s coming to,” he said with a shrug that she suspected he’d only half meant.

  “Me neither,” she said, frowning at the blue mat. “Are you the ‘gym fairy’ this morning?”

  “Yeah, sorry about that but Jack wants to make sure you can take care of yourself. And I wouldn’t recommend drinking any coffee or eating until after the workout. It’ll be easier to move.”

  “Yeah, actually it would,” Jack agreed.

  “Well, would you like some coffee? It’s the least I can do since I assume this is above and beyond what you usually do for B&E victims.”

  “No thanks. Above and beyond is our motto—we live to serve,” Emmett joked as he pushed himself off the floor. “Besides, I’ve heard about your coffee.”

  “I take it he wasn’t bragging.”

  Emmett lost his smile but Jack only nodded his head when he managed a “Sorry, buddy” as he was leaving.

  “Seriously, we’re going to do this before I have any coffee? Because I have to tell you that I may be a little grouchier than normal,” she warned.

  “Good. Stay that way,” he said as he straightened the mat.

  “You don’t seem all that happy either. What’s this about?”

  “I want to make sure you can handle yourself if some asshole grabs you when I’m not around.”

  “Does that mean a good-morning-I’m-happy-to-see-you-kiss is off the table until afterward?” She tried not to grin but she could tell he was trying not to stare at her breasts and not succeeding very well.

  “If I kiss you, we’re going to end up having a totally different experience and this mat has to go back to the gym, where I’m going to see it every time I work out and probably lose my concentration like I’m doing now, so quit grinning and get your ass over here.”

  Val was still grinning when she climbed over the settee but Sutton was in his growly, alpha-male mode and didn’t crack a smile. He flipped her around when she stood in front of him so that her ass was against his groin.

  It wouldn’t have done any good to ask if he was “happy to see her” because he was all business as he wrapped his arms around her chest.

  “Chances are that he’ll come at you from behind. If he grabs you around the torso and jerks your feet off the ground, throw all of your weight back and bring your heels down on top of his knees. His head will smack the pavement or floor and his knees are going to be fucked. You might have enough time to run away, screaming at the top of your lungs.”

  “Wouldn’t that bring him around if he’s out?”

  “No but it will wake up anyone else who might help you. If you’re worried he’s going to get up, don’t go for the obvious and kick him in the balls. You’ll be thrown off balance if he grabs your foot. If he rolls over to get up, don’t kick, stomp—hard. Go for the ankle and you’ll be far enough away that he might not be able to grab you. It will hobble him for at least a few minutes if you aren’t lucky enough to break it.

  “When I grab you
, aim for my head and plant your heels on top of my knees while you’re throwing your weight back.”

  “I don’t want to hurt you,” she said, and she wasn’t kidding. This sounded like a recipe for disaster.

  “Go through the movements but pull your punches. I need to know if you can do this. You don’t have to connect except for the weight part that will take me down.”

  It took her three tries before Sutton was satisfied she could pull off the move. He was the consummate instructor and so serious she stopped thinking of him as anyone other than the attacker he was pretending to be. It made her uncomfortable and each move brought home the fact that Jack was afraid. Definitely something she wasn’t used to.

  She was shaking by the time she stood at the edge of the mat with Jack facing her.

  “A knee to the groin is difficult if he’s a lot taller than you are,” he said. “And every attacker usually expects the move and will compensate. If it’s a frontal attack and he comes at you running, he’s trying to intimidate you so chances are he’ll lead with his torso. Grab his hair if you can and bring up your knee so you can crack him in the nose.”

  Her stomach rolled over but she nodded. It only took her one try to get it right and she miscalculated. By the time his nose quit bleeding, she was sick. Jack put his hand over hers and she let go of the improvised ice pack she’d made with a Ziploc bag.

  “There’s probably going to be blood if you do this right, Val. You can’t freak but you do need to scream and then run like hell.”

  She nodded again but she sat down beside him on the settee. “Got it, controlled freaking.”

  “Always be sure that you’re able to execute a move and if there’s something you can’t do, learn to compensate.”

  The bloodied nose wasn’t the last of his injuries. He had two red marks on the side of his neck. She’d located the pressure point on the first try. And it only took eleven pounds of pressure to break an elbow. She’d managed to pull her punch on that one. By the time he’d finished showing her moves he had a few more bruises but he was smiling.