Heart of a Hero: The Soldier's Seduction / The Heart of a Mercenary / Straight Through the Heart

He jumped when her small hand closed around him. Savoring the silken feeling of his body, so taut and hard, she tightened her grip the way she knew he liked and stroked him once, twice and yet again. His hips lifted and thrust against her and he growled. “Tease.”

She lightly bit his shoulder. “Tell me you don’t like it and I’ll stop.”

He sounded as if he were having trouble dragging air into his lungs. “Like that’s ever going to—oh, baby, yeah.”

As she positioned him at the throbbing entrance to her body, she lifted her hips. He was hot and solid and she cried out as he surged forward, embedding himself deeply within her. Her hands clenched on his buttocks, urging him to move, and within moments they established a fast, frantic rhythm that built a blazing fire within her. His body hammered against her, creating an ever-rising tension that stretched tighter and tighter until finally it snapped. As her body bucked and writhed in his arms, and then he was hoarsely calling her name as his body stiffened and froze in a shattering climax that left him shaking and gasping for breath.

When she could breathe again, think again, she stretched up and pressed a kiss to his shoulder. “Wow.”

He snorted and chuckled. “Yeah. Wow.” He rolled to one side and pulled her into his arms and she relaxed against him, enjoying the cuddling. “I think we’ve mastered that.”

“You do? As an educator, I can tell you that research shows that even when a skill has been mastered, a certain amount of practice is necessary to reinforce the concept.”

“Is that so?” He stroked a hand gently down over her hip and lightly squeezed her bottom. “In that case, I suppose we’ll just have to keep practicing until we’re sure we’ve got it right.”

Now it was her turn to laugh. “Could take a while.”

“It could,” he agreed.

Nine

Wade had a job interview on Friday with the company out of Virginia, the specialized security firm that was setting up a new branch. He’d met the personnel director already, and today’s interview, he told Phoebe, was with the owner of the company.

“He’s going to love you.” She picked up her coffee cup as he rose to put his dishes in the dishwasher. They’d gotten into a pleasant weekday routine in which they had breakfast together before she left. He usually had some kind of start on dinner before she arrived home, which meant she got her work done faster if she’d brought any home to grade, which meant that right after Bridget went to bed, she and Wade could go to bed, also.

Or at least go to the bedroom, she amended.

Every night he made love to her, stoking the blaze between them into a raging inferno of need. She awoke in his arms in the morning to a wild sense of unreality.

She’d had more than a year to accustom herself to the idea that Wade would not be a part of her life, and during half of that time she’d believed that he was dead. Sometimes it was difficult to believe that she really could be so happy. Although happy was a pale imitation of the feelings that rioted through her when she came through the door in the evening to see him there waiting for her, holding their daughter in the crook of one muscular arm.

When he pulled her to him and kissed her senseless, she was able to silence the one niggling voice in her head that reminded her that Wade might desire her…but he didn’t love her.

“Don’t worry about Bridget,” she said. “Angie is watching her all day.”

Wade nodded. “I could be back by lunch if this doesn’t fly. If it does…it’ll be late when I get home.”

She rose on tiptoe to kiss him as he straightened his uniform, liking the way he’d said home. As if they truly were a family already. “Good luck.”

She watched as he climbed into the rental car he still had, and waved as he drove off. “I love you,” she murmured.

Would she ever be able to say it aloud? He seemed happy, and he clearly was thrilled with fatherhood. And when he touched her…well, they had no problems in that department. She smiled to herself as warmth radiated through her. But sometimes she caught him staring into space with a faraway expression on his face and she wondered what he was thinking about.

She was afraid she knew. And she was afraid to ask.

Melanie. Oh, she remembered everything that had happened the night of the reunion, the way he’d looked at her as if she were some new treasure he’d discovered—but that had been one single night. And even then, when he’d realized how upset Melanie had been, he’d been quick to pursue her.

To reassure her that there was nothing between Phoebe and him?

She would never know. Just as she would never know how much he still thought of her sister, how often his heart ached with loss.

Phoebe’s insecurities, those feelings that had dominated her interactions with her sister most of her life, reared up and grabbed her attention every once in a while, reminding her that Wade had belonged to Melanie.

Never to her.

True, Wade seemed content now. But was it the familiarity of their friendship? His new fatherhood? Guilt at leaving her pregnant and alone? She feared it might be all three.

But he’s with me now. He couldn’t make love to me like that if he didn’t care for me at least a little. Could he? Stop being a pessimist.

The school day dragged. She wondered how Wade’s interview went. She checked her mobile phone for messages several times during the day, but he hadn’t called. Although she hadn’t expected him to, she worried that things hadn’t gone well.

He probably wouldn’t call her if the interview had not been successful. For all the years that she’d known him, Wade had been an intensely private man about his deepest feelings; she suspected that if he didn’t want to talk, prying any information out of him would be next to impossible.

It wasn’t until she saw the familiar outline of her little home that her spirits rose. Bridget was in there, with Angie. The sight of her daughter, the feel of that little body snuggled into her arms, was always balm to her sad moments.

Angie was sitting cross-legged on the couch, watching an afternoon soap opera, when Phoebe came through the door. “She was great today,” Angie informed her. “I laid her down for her afternoon nap about two so she shouldn’t get up again until at least four. I put the paper and the mail on the table.”

“Thank you so much,” Phoebe said. “I really appreciate you coming on short notice.”

“Not a problem.” Angie gathered her things. “Wish me luck on my psych test.”

“Luck.” Phoebe winked and smiled at her as Angie left. She set down her bag of paperwork from the day and slipped out of her shoes, then headed for the kitchen to get a drink.

As she sipped her tea, she glanced through the mail Angie had laid on the kitchen table. She set aside two bills and the grocery store flyer that had coupons in it, tossed three offers for credit cards in the trash, and laid out two envelopes of what looked like personal missives for immediate attention.

The first was a thank-you from a fellow teacher for whom she and her coworkers had thrown a bridal shower. The second bore an unfamiliar return address in California. Curious now, she slit the envelope and extracted a single sheet of paper.

Dear Mr. Merriman,

Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) thanks you for your generous donation in memory of your loved one, Melanie Merriman. May we express our deepest condolences on your loss. Melanie sounds as if she was indeed a special young woman.

With your donation…

Bewildered, Phoebe picked up the envelope and looked more closely at the address. The sender had gotten Wade’s name wrong on the envelope: it read Wade Merriman and she hadn’t even noticed that it wasn’t for her. Additionally, a change of address label had been slapped over the original and she realized it had been forwarded from his father’s home in California.

She reread the letter—and suddenly it began to make sense, horrible sense, and the small, fragile bubble of hope she’d allowed herself to feel burst.

Wade had made a donation in Melanie’s memory—in his loved one’s memory—to a charitable organization known nationally for its education programs targeting drinking and driving. His loved one. Phoebe registered the hit to her heart as desolation spread through her and tears stung her eyes.

It wasn’t that she begrudged the money, or the thought. A part of her treasured the realization that her sister’s name had been so honored. But now there was no way she could pretend that their marriage would be anything more than a convenience.

Now she knew for sure that there was no way Wade was ever going to love her because he was still in love with her sister. She sank down in a chair at the table and reread the letter twice more. Then she realized that if the letter hadn’t been forwarded, she never would have known about the donation.

A sob escaped without warning. She clapped a hand over her mouth, but the truth confronting her wouldn’t be denied and her efforts to resist the tears were futile. She had known Wade didn’t love her. She shouldn’t be so upset by this.

But she was. Not just upset, but devastated.

How could she marry him? Her heart wasn’t going to be able to take that kind of beating day after day. She’d been kidding herself, believing that she could love him enough to make a marriage work. Even for the sake of her sweet baby girl sleeping upstairs, she couldn’t do it.