Free Have Yourself a Marine Christmas (Always a Marine) by Heather Long Page A

sleeping and eyed the clock on the nightstand. Noel had borrowed his bathroom as soon as he’d finished.
    “Seven,” she answered, the partially closed door muffling her voice. The sound of water running interrupted them, and he imagined her washing her face, brushing her teeth—getting turned on by such mundane activities didn’t prepare him for when the water cut off and she opened the door.
    “Hey….” she said.
    All he saw was her long legs. She’d borrowed one of his T-shirts and it hit her at mid-thigh. Her long, wavy brown hair flowed around her shoulders and seemed to shine in the warm lamplight. His tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth and his brain stuttered. “Hey.”
    Pushing away from the door, she strolled toward him. “So I was thinking….”
    “Yeah?” He couldn’t stop staring at her. She teased him with her gaze, and he’d been shirtless around her any number of times—hell, he’d been naked. She’d touched him everywhere, eased cramps in his thighs, rubbed his shoulders, massaged his arms—but this was different.
    There was nothing clinical in the way she watched him or the heat licking over his skin in response. Stopping right in front of him, she kept her hands loose at her sides and he had to angle his head to meet her gaze. He waited, unable to do anything else.
    “Do you have any idea what it does to me when you look at me like that?” she asked.
    “Like what?”
    “Like you’re a starving man and I’m the first meal you’ve seen in a long time.” The minute she’d said the words, she swallowed hard.
    Hard.
    The air between them thickened, and his heart slowed. The whole world narrowed down to that moment, and he studied her.
    She was nervous. His beautiful, vibrant, wildly strong woman was anxious. The revelation took the edginess off.
    “C’mere,” he invited and she closed the distance between them. Trailing his fingers up the backs of her thighs, he cupped her ass—her deliciously bare ass under the cotton of his shirt and lifted her until she straddled his lap. The silky dampness of her heat tormented the hell out of him, but he settled her in place and held completely still.
    “I like looking at you,” he whispered half-to-her and half-to-himself. “I keep telling myself we have to take it slow, but it feels good to look at you—to want you—to touch you. And I like how you look at me, too.”
    She shuddered and the action stroked him through the fabric of his shorts. The liquid heat beckoned, but he kept his grip on her gentle. Right then, it wasn’t about him, but about her. She balanced, resting her hands on his shoulders, but she made no move to pull away or to take control of her weight.
    The trust speared him.
    “I’m scared,” she admitted, and since he’d suspected as much—he only nodded.
    “Of what?” He ordered his body to behave itself. Months of grueling therapy had given him a rigid sense of self-control. Noel needed him and by God, he would be exactly what she needed. “You know you can tell me anything,” he soothed when she continued to hesitate. If she retreated, it would hurt—but he would accept it.
    Salter kissing her lit something in him, and he’d pushed hard all week. Pushed to keep her close and gotten drunk off her kisses. He could afford to be patient.
    Her lashes lowered, shielding her eyes and when she raised them again, desire and worry flickered in their depths. “Worried that you’re attached to me because of your recovery.”
    Yeah, the words hurt, but he ruthlessly suppressed the kneejerk reaction and concentrated on listening to her.
    “I’ve seen it happen before.” She paused and sucked her upper lip between her teeth. “God, I sound like a baby. I like you a lot, not just as a patient, but the man underneath. The man who finds a smile even when he’s hurting, who makes other people laugh—who listens to me and does what he has to do. Hell, I even like it when you’re pigheaded and stubborn.” Tears