Free Nobody's Hero by Kallypso Masters

after the firefight in Fallujah. The grief
had nearly crushed him before he decided to start the club with
Marc. Damián joined in later, also needing a lifeline to hold onto.
His friends may not realize it, but they had helped him keep his
sanity when the reality of a life without Joni had finally sunk
in.
    He pulled her closer and stroked her hair.
God, he loved her hair. So silky. Like her skin. She reached up to
cup his jaw, then lifted her head from his shoulder and turned his
face to meet hers.
    “Kiss me, Adam.” Her breath against his mouth
set his dick to throbbing.
    “Let’s not go there again. If I kiss you, I
won’t stop.” He reached up to brush a strand of hair away from her
eyes. “Hon, I care too much about you. I’d just hurt you.”
    “You could never hurt me. Not intentionally.
You’re the gentlest man I know.”
    The unsettling flashbacks he’d experienced
earlier had jarred him, and he pushed her away, speaking more
harshly than he’d intended. “You don’t know anything about me.”
    “I know everything I need to know. Maybe
there are a few things you need to learn about me, too, Adam.” She
sat up straighter, but her gaze never left his. “I am an
adult—twenty-five.”
    “Exactly half my age.”
    “Don’t interrupt.”
    “Yes, ma’am.” He grinned in spite of himself.
She was so damned sexy when she stood up to him. Everyone else
buckled under to his authority, but not Karla. Well, she’d kept her
distance from him the last few months, sensing his foul mood, but
since he’d awakened to find her lying in his arms in his hospital
bed, she’d let him know she wasn’t going to take any more evasive
shit from him.
    Her declaring war on him tonight did nothing
but conjure up fantasies of getting her to submit to him when he
finally conquered her. He had no doubt he would conquer her,
either, if he allowed this to continue—which he had no intention of
doing. Karla was strong, but she was no match for him when he was
back in top condition. Fuck . Even though he didn’t want her
to submit to him, he couldn’t banish the image of Karla kneeling
before him, her long black hair covering her bare breasts, waiting
to do his bidding. His dick throbbed even more—directly against her
ass. She smiled. Damn her.
    Damn him . Having her sitting in his
lap was no better than having her in his bed. Exponentially worse.
At least the bed was king-sized and he could keep her at arm’s
length. Yeah, like that worked for you before, dickwad. No,
his body deep in sleep had gravitated toward hers earlier, until
he’d accosted her in her sleep.
    “I know you want me, even if you try to tell
yourself you don’t.”
    He looked into her sparkling blue eyes.
“You’re beautiful, Karla. Any man would be attracted to you. But
you need me to be your guardian, not your lover.”
    “I want you to be my lover, Adam, more
than anything. I want you to teach me to be your submissive.”
    “Hell, no.”
    She pulled back, wrinkling her forehead. “Why
not?”
    “First of all, I think you might need a submissive more than you need to be one.”
    “I loved it when you tied me up. I felt
so…free. That doesn’t make sense, but that’s how I felt.”
    Hell, it made perfect sense, if she
were a submissive. She wasn’t . Besides, he didn’t need to be
thinking about tying her up at the moment. The one time he’d done
so before, she’d managed to get her claws in too deep under his
skin.
    “And I’ve seen some people in the club who
top one time and bottom another. Maybe I’m one of those.”
    “A switch?” The thought of watching her
playing Domme with anyone at the club didn’t sit well with him
either—and no woman would ever top him. However, seeing her
dominated by anyone else caused his gut to churn. But being her Dom
wasn’t an image he would entertain either. She had no natural
interest in the lifestyle. She only wanted to get close to him
because of her damned hero worship—in spite of