Perfectly Exposed (Command Unit Book 1) (8 page)

It had been difficult to walk into the kitchen full of people she hardly knew but who were aware of everything that had happened to her. Finding the strength to be open enough to talk had made her arrogantly sure that she could shake off the emotional damage. Looking at the man, even with his head turned away, put her right back in the container. She was suddenly helpless, beaten down, powerless, terrified. Just from looking at his picture.

They had known it, too. Brad’s kiss to her forehead, the whispered words of praise intentionally meant to break through her terror. Jack hustled her into a safe environment where she got to make a choice that took back her power, her freedom, all of them fighting for her. Opening her eyes, Hailey looked at the man across from her.

His arms rested atop the tub’s rim, stretched out loosely, his long body seemingly relaxed. The water came high on his waist, leaving the upper ridges and valleys laddering his torso on display, flowing into the roped power of his chest. He personified male grace at rest, except for his eyes. The eyes were those of a predator, alert, watchful, tireless.

“I know what you did,” she informed him softly.

“What’s that?” he smiled.

“Gave me a choice that was hard but not too hard, one that let me feel in control of my response to the monster.”

It was an oversized hot tub so when Hailey pushed off her side and floated to Jack, her body extended on the cushion of bubbles, her hands anchored her on his shoulders. Face in his neck, she whispered, “Thank you,” as she dropped kisses to the flexing flesh by her hand.

The only part he moved was to turn his head to put lips in her hair. His arms remained stretched out as he said into the top of her head, “I’ll give you ten minutes to stop that, and then you’re in trouble.” His deeply rumbling tone purred over her, a velvet caress of approval.

“What kind of trouble?” she wanted to know between kisses.

Jack groaned as the tip of her tongue wandered up the tendon on his neck to his earlobe. “The kind where you get to keep doing that, ah…” He lost his train of thought when her mouth moved under his chin to the other ear. “Jesus, Hailey,” he breathed. “You know I can’t touch you, baby.”

“Mmmm,” Hailey agreed with him, her lips moving to explore a tense shoulder.

Touching him, finding she could do it sensually, this was an empowering surprise and she liked it. It felt like taking her life back somehow. One hand trailed down his hard abdomen, the path of intent obvious. His face turned with the movements of her head, buried in her hair. His growl was loud in her ear when her hand closed around the evidence of his pleasure.

Exploring slowly, lips on his skin, hand around his cock, Hailey took her time. Jack’s body moved in the water, turning for her, thrusting into her hand, clenching under her lips, the words he whispered into her hair explaining how beautiful her touch was to him, how much he wanted to pleasure her back, how deeply he loved her. The litany was erotic, explicit and so damn intimate he built heat in her body without even touching her.

So intense, the pleasure of his mind stroking hers, she had to lay her head on his shoulder and pant through the need. He gently lifted her hand off his cock as he told her how he intended to take her from behind, holding her up in front of him so he could reach her breasts and clit. Placing her hand on his chest, his hands slid into the water to reach down her body, long fingers petting between her legs and lightly stroking the clit he spoke of so possessively. He did it gently, but not lightly.

Fingers explored, stroked, entered her and glided back to the bundle of nerves that lit her up. His words darkly sexy, telling her how she belonged to him, would always be his but most especially how this was his. Lips to her ear, fingers strumming her body in the most intimate way he told her of the hunger in his soul that made him hers.

Her face pressed to his neck, floating in the decadent luxury of the enormous hot tub, Jack’s fingers flicking carefully but insistently across her clit, Hailey came. Not hard, not like what they shared before. This was gentle, a burn that rolled instead of rioted through her. Yet the intimacy of it was so painfully powerful she didn’t even try to hold back the tears.

“Shhhh, baby. Don’t cry,” he soothed lips still in her hair, both his hands lightly brushing up and down her sides, petting without inflicting pressure. “My beautiful baby, don’t cry.”

“Not beautiful,” she sniffled, trying to get a handle on the emotions.

“Stunning,” he insisted softly. “So damn beautiful in her courage she brings me to my knees. Look at what you just gave me, what you didn’t let anyone take away from us. Jesus, I love you so damn much.”

“Oh God,” Hailey moaned. “You’re killing me. I’ve never felt less attractive in my life and you give me the most intimate sexual experience imaginable. A girl gets to cry when that happens. Especially when the man she loves says all that stuff to her.”

Jack chuckled into her hair. “Okay, baby. You get to do whatever you want. And that will probably be the case every time you tell me you love me.”

Hailey nodded and snuggled her face on his shoulder. “I’ll try not to use my power for evil.”

“I’d appreciate that,” he growled.

***

They stayed at the Marks’ ranch a week and most of that time there was only the women and Jack, along with the regular ranch staff. There was no secret made of the fact that Angie, Jack, and the ranch foreman split up guard duty on the house and grounds while the other Command members were spread around the globe tracking.

Yesterday, Hailey and Jack were on the pool deck when he got the call from his father. Acquisition of the target had been successful. Smoke, Pike and Blue would be overseas for a while longer, ensuring the target really was secured and didn’t have further descendants ready to take up his mission. Two days earlier Mike and Sam had communicated the success of their hunt as well.

Angie had taken off after the call from Smoke. “I got your back, girl,” was Angie’s goodbye to Hailey so she was pretty sure things were about to get interesting wherever Smoke was holding the target.

Brad and Dean had returned to the ranch last night. So today Jack was taking her home.

Looking into the bathroom mirror, she supposed things could be worse. They certainly had been a week ago, but she still looked like a horror movie experiment. The bruises were the fabulous shades of yellow through purple, only beginning to fade. Swelling had gone down, that was something.

Her ribs were still tender so a bra was just torture. Her current fashion statement consisted of soft leggings and huge men’s shirts. Anything else was just too uncomfortable. Jack liked the wardrobe. His hands seemed to be on her body all the time. Gently, lightly but always touching her. It felt good. It felt really good. Like she was beautiful. Like she was irresistible.

They slept together every night but there hadn’t been sex, except in the hot tub. Jack was serious about her time in there, twice a day no less. Insisting it was good for her, and she liked that too. Weightless and abandoned with a man who couldn’t get enough of touching her, where was the bad in that?

But now, assessing the remaining evidence of her ordeal in the mirror, Hailey knew it was time for her to face reality. Normal life was about to start again and there were things to be discussed.

Jack entered the room, striding right up behind her, his chest to her back, hands sliding around her waist, lightly, gently, holding her.

“I’m not pregnant,” Hailey stated softly, her eyes on his in the mirror.

“I know,” Jack agreed calmly.

Hailey let her head drop back on his chest. Her body relaxed and leaned into his strong frame. “There is no reason to rush into things anymore.”

His head tilted to the side just slightly, watching her intently in the mirror.

Naked, standing in front of a fully clothed man, Hailey realized she didn’t have one problem with the exposure. Not with Jack. He’d taken care of that, erased even the thought of a problem from her reality. She stood before him perfectly exposed, bruises, ugly spots and all, relaxed. Even though she was tense about the discussion, she was still relaxed.

“My woman sleeps in my bed,” he stated. “We’re getting a house but that takes time, baby. Until then my bed is in your apartment.”

Hailey smiled and bit her lip at the same time. “Okay.”

Jack raised a brow. “We done, baby?”

Hailey nodded.

“Good.” One of his hands slid down and around to palm her butt. “Get dressed. Want to be on the road in ten. Stuff is already in the car.” His head dropped to nuzzle her hair aside and kiss her shoulder. “Need to get my woman home,” he whispered. “I’m tired of sharing walls with people who will comment when my baby screams for me.” Then he was gone.

That answered the sex question, she mused. He was waiting for her to recover, but mostly her man was private about their private life. She liked that.

So Hailey went about the business of pulling on clothes. Makeup was useless yet and he had already packed the few things she owned on the premises. It was time to let her man take her home.

Epilogue

His hands moved over her. Possessive, insistent, demanding hands that played her body with the finesse of experience. He knew her every secret, every weakness and he was ruthless. There was no mercy in the man pressed to her back as she knelt before him, hot and hard, pounding into her from behind. One hand gripped her breast, fingers clamped around a nipple, rolling as he pulled that sensitive peak. Shooting fire down her body to the other place he tormented.

Hours he’d kept at her, first his mouth, then his hands, exploring every inch of her. Turning her, sometimes restraining her, moving over her body with touches so intimate he seared her soul with them. Now steel thighs on the inside of hers spread her open for his penetration. She was bent, hands grasping the headboard, exposed for his pleasure in every way.

Powering into her body with the thick cock that stretched her tight, his other hand worked her most sensitive flesh. Applying the most exquisite pressure, taking her to the edge of ecstasy, and then his fingers left her,
again
.

“No, please, please, Jack,” Hailey moaned in desperation.

His face in her hair, his lips at her ear, the guttural growl rumbled right down to her bones. “What does my girl need?”

“I need to come,” Hailey gasped.

“Anything, anytime.”

And there it was. Fingers strummed her clit with just the right pressure as his other hand released her breast to land on the outside of her thigh in a sharp spank. “Come for me, Hailey,” Jack demanded.

And she did. Oh God! The explosion ripped through her with searing pleasure. That was the first time she’d felt the primal snap of his hand on her flesh since they had returned home three months ago. The surprise wasn’t what made the orgasm so intense. No, it was the freedom of that little spank that propelled her into the stratosphere. His hand landing on her was freedom from fear, freedom from pain, freedom from even the memory of it. Jack gave her that and he’d done it with so much pleasure that she briefly wondered if she was going to pass out.

He moved in her, powering though her body’s contractions, forcing the pleasure to linger, drawing it out. Only after the shudders subsided did he pull her off the headboard and down the bed, his body still deeply buried in her. A big hand applied pressure to the small of her back, pressing her head to the bed.

“Now you’re going to take me, baby,” he growled.

Hailey relaxed into position, head down and arms extended above her to hold on to the edge of the mattress, legs spread wide. Lifting her head a bit, she watched him over her shoulder.

Jack adjusted his knees. His hands gripped her hips as his body straightened and his head bent to watch their connection. Power gathered in the perfect male who held her in position, flexing as he pulled out and slowly pushed back in. And then it let lose.

Hailey turned her face back to the bed, closed her eyes and focused on the encompassing pleasure of Jack fucking her hard. Taking what he needed and not having to go gentle. It was magnificent! She came again before he did, but when he did, her man howled his pleasure in a deep-throated shout. And that was even better.

However long it took to sink back into reality, Hailey wasn’t sure. Perhaps she did pass out this time. Jack was slowly withdrawing from her body, a loss. Sinking down beside her, he rolled her to her back.

“Don’t move,” he snarled, the throaty texture of his tone telling her he wasn’t much more recovered than she was.

The bed dipped a few minutes later. “Give me that pussy,” he directed as he did every time. Hailey lazily cocked her legs, feet flat to the bed on either side of him. Jack gently moved the warm cloth over sensitive folds, cleaning the remains of their play from her.

Not that there was much to remove. He used a condom every time. When she offered to get back on the Pill he’d frowned and asked her carefully, “Baby, do you want that?”

“I guess,” she responded, his scowl making her hesitant.

“Tell you what I think, but it’s your body, your choice,” he continued. “I don’t like you ingesting the chemicals. When we decide to have a baby, I don’t want to wait another month either. So it’s up to you, but I’d rather you didn’t. I can take care of you now, and I want too.”

So he had. He took care of her, the contraception, all of it.

Now he tossed the washcloth at the bathroom door. He was always the first one out of bed so he picked it up in the mornings, giving her no reason to complain about that male habit. He turned off the bedside light. Rolling into bed, he arranged her with her back to his chest, her head pillowed on his upper arm, the other arm slung over her waist. A thick leg pressed between hers and they settled into their usual sleeping positions.

“So did you look at the house?” Jack asked.

“Yeah,” Hailey said softly.

“Like it?”

“Yeah.”

“Is that the one?” he pressed, his tone gentle as ever.

“No, it’s not our house.”

“Baby, it has the country kitchen, the art studio overlooking the lake, five bedrooms that are the right size, what is wrong with it?” Jack wanted to know.

Hailey sighed deeply. It was a perfect house but it was also perfectly huge and expensive. Why he kept sending her to look at places that far out of their reach she couldn’t begin to understand. But he did, this was like the fifth one.

“It’s just not practical. That’s too much house for us.” She tried to explain gently. Men were proud creatures and she knew he wanted to give her a dream house. She just didn’t need it.

Jack suddenly shifted, rolling her to her back as he reached behind him to flick on the bedside light again. Coming up on an elbow so he could see her face, he studied the most beautiful girl in the world who was looking up at him.

“How is it too much house? If you’re worried about spending your life cleaning it, don’t. We’ll get a service.” He tried to figure out her problem and solve it.

“Jack,” Hailey huffed. “I don’t want to be house poor. I don’t need my dream house to be happy. Let’s look at things we can really afford.”

“Really afford?” Jack asked incredulously as her problem dawned on him.

“Yeah, really afford,” Hailey conformed softly. “Honey, I know how much a one bedroom apartment in this complex costs. I looked at them too. Together we can do a house, but why make life harder than it has to be? We can start small and see what happens from there. I’m really happy no matter what we get.”

Jack was grinning down at her. Hailey waited but he seemed to be taking his time. Good. He was listening to her and hopefully scaling back on the house burden.

“Baby,” he drawled softly, “I live in this complex because I can’t keep away from a smoking-hot office manager who works at the museum. But for me, it’s living lean. That’s okay because who do I have to impress besides her?” He paused as her eyes blinked and narrowed slightly.

“We will be paying cash for whatever house we choose. I could do the asking price on the one you looked at today but that would be stupid. Cash means a deep discount and I intend to take that. We will be furnishing it with whatever my woman wants. Also with cash. And after that, I’m going to try and get her to fill the bedrooms with kids so I hope she doesn’t insist on working. She doesn’t need to and we will still send three kids to college and not take out a single college loan.”

Hailey’s eyes were now round orbs staring up at him.

“When I say I’ve been living lean, I mean I’ve been putting away what most executives make in a year, each job I take. For the last five years I have been taking a lot of jobs because my woman wasn’t my woman yet and I needed something to do so I wouldn’t go fucking postal on anyone she had lunch with. And so I wouldn’t think about it if she was doing more than lunch while she grew up some. A lot of jobs. Back to back for five years.”

Hailey’s mouth opened and closed. Her eyes squeezed shut a moment and then she was frowning up at him.

“The actual numbers of our price range, you might have mentioned that two months ago,” she stated tartly. “How was I supposed to know you are stupid rich?”

“Don’t know.” He chuckled. “Somehow I thought you knew the kind of money group members make. Your girlfriend Julie has a McManson in Connecticut and one in Florida. The Marks Ranch is world class and I suppose I just assumed it would connect for you.”

“Well, I didn’t think about it.” Hailey huffed, her frown still in place.

“So is that the house?” Jack returned to the original topic. “Because I like it. The four-car garage and work shed are good for me. I like the pool and its lake view. What do you say?”

“As far as dream houses go…” Hailey tried to keep frowning. “I think I could make do with it.”

Jack’s head lowered and then he was kissing her again. As always, things got fuzzy for Hailey when he did that all slow and deep.

When she opened her eyes again he was holding a little blue velvet box in front of her face. “I’m buying that house for my wife,” he said softly.

Hailey’s eyes bounced from the box to his face and back again. Jack pulled himself up so his back was to the headboard, an arm around her brought her with him. He flipped the box it open. Taking out the ring, Jack picked up her trembling hand and slid the exquisite princess-cut diamond with pavé stones trailing down the sides of the band onto her finger.

“I’d ask the question, baby, but that implies you could say no. In the interest of total honesty, we are getting married. I don’t care when, how big or small the ceremony is, just so long as you are happy with it.”

“I love you, Jack.” Hailey got past the tears as she looked at her hand with its huge diamond. “But I’ve got to say, I’m shocked at the size of this. Even with the bank balance thing you just told me. Not that you can have it back,” she instantly clarified.

Jack kissed her forehead. “Found out making a statement about possession is pretty fucking important to me,” he confessed softly, enjoying watching her admire her ring almost more than slipping it on her finger.

“Well, this says I’m yours, as well as a small South American country with a strong pharisaical trade,” Hailey told him. “Statement made.”

“Good. Buying a house tomorrow. Time to sleep.” Jack slid down the bed, arranging them and flipping off the light.

“Honey,” Hailey said softly. “I think the rock is still glowing.”

“Smartass,” he growled.