Page 34 of The Captain
The image flashed hard and hot—his body between Karl and me at the bar, the way he handled it fast and quiet. No chest beating. No speeches. Just control that saidminewithout a word. Possessive and protective in the same breath. It curled low in me and lit everything brighter.
I wanted that focus on me. I wanted all of it.
I came again, sharper, my body locking around him like I could keep him forever, stars going off behind my eyes. Heswore, caught my hips, ground me down to take him deep. I shook apart on him, palms slipping on canvas, legs quivering, breath gone. He didn’t let me float off. His mouth closed on my nipple again, his other hand slid to my throat—not choking, just claiming, thumb under my jaw like a man reminding me where my breath lived.
“Breathe,” he said, benediction.
I did, greedy. “Inside me,” I said when speech came back. “If you want.”
He stilled. “You’re sure?”
I took his wrist and pressed my pulse to his thumb. “I want you.”
Something in his face tightened, something in me loosened. He flipped us like a clean command—me on my back now, knees open, heels hooked behind his thighs. The tent shrank around his size, the world narrowed to stroke and breath. He braced over me and drove in with that same focused violence that made my brain go white.
“ka-MEE,” he said again, like the answer to a question he’d been asking all day, and fucked me like he was praying and staking a claim at the same time—deep, deliberate, no wasted motion. I met him with everything left, hips up, mouth open.
“Harder,” I begged, ridiculous, greedy.
“Yeah,” he said, and broke whatever was left.
I felt him go an instant before it hit—a stutter, a bit lip, a filthy vow in a voice that made promises feel like facts. He shoved deep and came with a rough sound like a man dragging himself out of the ocean, heat flooding me in pulses I rode out with nails in his back and heels digging. He kept himself buried until the last tremor, until we were both shaking.
We lay there panting, canvas damp and loud over our heads, ocean steady outside, his weight on me heavy in the best way.The duffel made a ridiculous pillow. Sweat cooled. A breeze found the zipper and worried it.
“You’re heavy,” I said into his shoulder.
“You’re small,” he said into my hair, amused and wrecked.
I laughed, unguarded. He rolled to the side, kept me close, slid a hand down my back like he was checking I hadn’t slipped out of my own skin. His thumb drew idle circles high on my ass. My body hummed in a low, satisfied note.
“Tell me you’re not Navy,” I said into the dark because even with his come slick inside me, I was still me.
“Marine,” he said, easy. Then, quieter, “And right now I’m just a man who brought you a tent on the beach.”
That tugged a smile out of me. “And gear,” I said. “Marcus’s idea of foreplay.”
“Something like that.” A beat. “The rest really is for your team.”
“I’ll allow it,” I said, letting fairness sit warm between us.
Wind fussed at the fly. My phone buzzed in my shorts—Becca:Resp 22. Lactate steady. Kogia quiet. All’s well.
The relief was a long thread unwinding. I showed him the screen. He nodded like the numbers were music.
“Earlier,” he said, voice a shade different now that we were soft and sated, “Marcus told me I’m supposed to be your liaison.”
My body went still under his hand. “Of course, he did.”
“I didn’t ask for it,” he said. “But I’m not your enemy.”
“I don’t need a handler,” I said, reflexive edge.
“I’m not a handler.” His mouth touched my shoulder, a punctuation mark. “I’m a rope you can pull. Or a knife. Or a brick through the right window.”
As annoying as it was, that made me feel safer. “I’m trying not to hate uniforms on principle,” I said. “My father told me to slow down. I slowed down today.”
“I heard about your dad’s yard.” He propped himself on an elbow. I could feel his gaze even if I couldn’t see it. “That tag in your pen.”
