Page 66 of Vaquero
Chapter Twenty-Six
They made it to Meg’s private room without encountering any Army Rangers along their convoluted way. But once Julio closed the door and turned the key in the lock, he only had eyes for his woman. Meg had all but pulled him inside this room. He wasn’t carrying on board, per Navy rules, so he had no holster or weapons to worry about. He’d safely stored his gear bag full of ammo with the quartermaster. Which made getting undressed easier. Quicker.
He helped her unbutton his shirt, then toed out of his boots while she undid his belt. He held stock still when she slid her hands over his ass until his pants pooled over his feet. He kicked them aside, then unbuttoned her blouse. Unzipped her jeans. Peeled everything off but her underclothes and her protective bandana.
They hadn’t turned any lights on, but he wished he’d thought to do that now. He needed to see the amazing woman rubbing her breasts against his chest and running her fingers through his hair and into his scalp. He closed his eyes at the tender explosions sounding off in his heart. If she only knew what this stolen moment meant to him. How long he’d needed what she was giving him freely. A woman’s touch meant so damned much. It nearly unmanned him.
“Lights,” he managed to say before things got too far out of control. By then, he was down to his socks and jockeys. She was in her bra and panties, and damn it, yes. He wanted to see her. All of her.
“Well, umm, okay,” she murmured shyly. “I guess. If you have to.”
“I want to see your eyes, Meg.”
He could hear her hand smoothing over the wall behind them until a softclicksounded. The lamps on both nightstands flashed on and—
His heart nearly stopped. Standing in front of him was a goddess, a full-breasted, wide-hipped goddess with creamy skin beneath the skimpy underwear she still had on. Her eyes were a mellow emerald, hazy and dark. Her lids were heavy. Her lips were swollen and still shiny wet from his mouth. A soft pink blush dusted the crests of her cheeks. Those lush, thick lashes blinking up at him tugged at his heart. It’d mean so much if she trusted him enough to lose that bandana. To let him see all of her, not just her very sexy body. But her whole heart.
She was, after all, nearly naked already. Yet he understood. That little scrap of cloth on her head wasn’t about modesty. It was about trust, and trust didn’t come on command. It had to be earned. When she was ready, she’d know how deeply he already cared about her. He could wait.
But what did she see in a guy like him? Julio ran a quick hand over his head, perplexed. He had no idea.
Just that fast, her brows slammed together, and her hands slapped onto her hips. That amazingly brash, don’t-make-me-ask-you-twice glare zeroed in on him. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” he hedged.
To prove how right everything was, Julio stepped into her, wrapped her inside his arms, and pulled her body flush against his. Nothing that was about to happen next could ever be wrong. In fact, for the first time in his life, the world felt right. His doubt faded the moment he realized he had to trust this woman if he wanted her to trust him. Was there any doubt? Okay then. He could do that.
“Strip,” he ordered as he grabbed his pants up off the floor and searched his wallet for the condom he wasn’t sure he still carried. A man with no dreams didn’t hang onto things he had no intention of using. Damn. No condom. Even if he’d found one, it would’ve been too old to rely on. He let his pants fall.
With a wink, Meg reached behind her back and undid her bra. It flew over her head. But he stopped her just before she bent forward to remove her panties. He had to. She was far too obedient, and the sight of her bare breasts swaying free and heavy… hot-damned erotic. Every milligram of blood in his brain fled south. Every muscle in his body went rigid and ready for action. But this wasn’t about speed. At all. It might not even happen, if he couldn’t locate some protection pretty soon. Like an hour ago. Damn it. He should’ve planned ahead!
“Not yet,” he breathed raggedly, his breath coming in short hard bursts and his heart pounding like a drum. Couldn’t she hear it? He sure could. What he couldn’t do was tear his gaze from the plump, pillowy, creamy-white breasts and the pebbled nipples jutting out at him. Or the delightfully deep valley squeezed between them. His mouth watered even as his throat went dry. So much beautiful, soft-as-silk skin. He shouldn’t have told Meg to strip, but who knew she’d be so eager to please him? So damned heartbreakingly beautiful? “F-first things first—”
“You looking for this?” A square foil packet glimmered between her fingertips.
“Yes,” he admitted hoarsely. “You came prepared?”
Her shoulders lifted. “Not usually, but with you, I was sure hopeful.”
Without another word, he had her back in his arms. His greedy mouth descended to her breast and nipple in wanton hunger. Once again, Meg arched, this time backward. In doing so, she pushed that succulent breast between his lips and into his mouth. Cocking his head, he opened wider, needing to lick and taste, nibble and suckle everything that was Meg.
Hollowing his cheeks, he worked that succulent tip until he drew a ragged moan out of her. Easing back, he breathed on that wet morsel. Goosebumps blossomed over her bare skin, and the tiniest spark ignited at his tailbone. Julio was too far smitten with the panting woman in his arms to hold back now. With his mouth actively engaged in doing what it did best—eating—he backed Meg to the edge of the bed, then gathered her against him and laid her carefully down.
She relaxed onto the pristine, white pillow with a sigh, wearing just that bandana and her panties. But what a sight. This dreamy-eyed woman staring up at him with stars in her big, bright eyes took his breath.
Julio knelt reverently between her legs, his arms alongside her head and his heart in his throat. Gently, he tugged her final thin silken line of resistance to the side. Just as he’d suspected. She was a redhead.
It was then the magic happened. With one quick swipe of her hand, her bandana was gone, tossed to who knew where. Only the panties remained, and they weren’t going to stop Julio. The sight of her shorn head and those beautiful eyes full of vivid green trust, elicited a powerful surge of gotta-have-her-right-damned-now.
Sliding his fingers under the elastic waistband of his boxers, he scraped them off and tossed them aside. Exposing himself to what could very well be the same feminine disappointment he’d known with his wife, he waited. He knew his body had been built for labor, not beauty. He was not a good-looking man. Had never strived to be more than what he was. One didn’t grow up in the harsh deserts of Mexico without a few bumps and bruises along the way. Without a few fistfights. His nose was too big and his fingers too stubby. He was plain, but dependable. A burro. Never a thoroughbred. Slow and steady like an armored desert tortoise. He got the hardest jobs done without flair or panache.
But the stars in Meg’s eyes were real. He knew the moment she wrapped one hand around him and pumped, stroking him from root to tip, that she truly wanted him. All of him. Not just his Navy paycheck. Then she made it better. Tearing that foil packet with her teeth, she gloved him. Those beautiful green eyes never once blinked or looked away. It pleased him to know that Meg cared about protection, too. Not only for herself, but for that unborn child in her future. That it would be planned for and conceived somewhere besides in a borrowed Navy rack.
The wondrous, greedy glitter he saw there, combined with the seductive way she licked her lips, fanned the spark at the end of Julio’s spine into a roaring inferno. Passion for this woman’s heart, for her soul, gripped him now.
For the first time in years, Julio became a man on the best of missions. Breathing hard, he locked gazes with Meg, needing her permission before he went any farther. It’d been too long since he’d been with a woman, but now, the Juarez train had left the station and was barreling down the track. Straight for her.
“What are you waiting for?” she growled up at him, her face lit with a heavenly grace that seemed to glow from every pore. She made it better when she crooked her legs around his waist and opened wider, her heels digging into the cheeks of his ass.
