Free A Candle for a Marine (Always a Marine) by Heather Long

if you show me yours.”
    “I don’t. Date, that is. I’m a Marine who’s been deployed pretty steadily for the last eight years.” His rapid-fire response came with a faint curve of his lips. “Your turn.”
    “No women at all?” She found that hard to believe. Isaac had been a demanding lover, not that he hadn’t given in equal measure, but once they’d become sexually active, it had been more a case of finding the opportunities rather than the drive.
    “I won’t lie. There has been an occasional woman, usually someone I picked up on a leave and wouldn’t see again.” His lids dropped, hiding his eyes from her. “No one who meant anything.”
    The knowledge hurt, however, and deflated any playfulness. Of course there had been other women. Why wouldn’t there be? They had no ties, not after that last conversation. He’d never reached out to her, and she hadn’t attempted to either.
    “Z?” He nudged her chin up again.
    “Of course. I mean, it makes sense.” It didn’t stop the trembling in her limbs or the bleeding cut in her soul. “I’ve dated a few men. Nothing serious.” None became her lovers. One or two seemed to be on the fast track for that, but something always held her back. “I’m not sure about dinner though. I have a bit of a headache and….”
    “Hey.” He cupped her face. “Stop.”
    “What?” She blinked up at him.
    “Stop. And breathe.” Once he’d mentioned it, she realized she’d been panting in shallower and shallower breaths. Squeezing her eyes shut, she wished she could close down the awareness of him holding her and being so close. The deep inhale she sucked in tasted of Isaac and turned her insides to jelly.
    “Z, tonight was about dinner, about getting to know each other again. We connect on a lot of levels, you and me. We have a lot of history and a lot of emotion.” The patience in his voice accompanied the soft stroke of his thumbs on her cheeks, and eased the rapid pace of her heart.
    She forced her eyes open. “I’m scared.”
    “Me, too.” He met her bald bluntness with raw honesty. “I thought I was over you.”
    “You’re not.” It wasn’t a question, because her emotions were so tangled up between the present and the past. She didn’t know which feelings belonged where.
    “No.” He shook his head and dipped his face closer to hers. “And I don’t think I want to be.” He gave the words a moment to register before slanting his mouth across hers.
    Surprise rippled through her and the knot inside loosened a fraction. Unwilling, or maybe simply unable to stay a passive participant, she wrapped her arms around his neck and opened her lips to his questing tongue. He crushed her to him, and she forgot to think about anything else at all.

 
     
     

Chapter Eight
     
     
    He’d meant to tease her, especially when she stared at him with such vulnerable eyes. What began as a simple brush of his lips over hers turned molten. Heat flamed through him with an intensity he hadn’t experienced since he was a teenager. The flash of need he felt the first since the last time she’d been in his arms. A part of his brain detailed the sensations like a catalog of first experiences. Zehava was the first girl he’d ever kissed, the first one whose body he ever touched. They’d lost their virginity together in a series of fumbling moves as passionate as they were inexpert.
    Kissing her was like going home, returning unerringly to where he belonged, and damn if she didn’t know how to light him up. Her mouth opened, and she tangled her tongue with his. She dragged her nails lightly along his scalp and pressed into him with only the slightest urging on his part.
    Zehava fit him, from the swell of her breasts to the lush curve of her hips. His body tightened, remembering her well, and he traced his hands up and down her spine then cupped her ass and lifted. Trapped between him and the wall, she wrapped her thighs on his hips and let him support her.
    The