“That’s not gonna happen.”

“Oh, really?” She smiled at the fierceness in his voice. The absolutely certainty he could stop it from happening by sheer will and determination alone. “Who’s going to stop it? I was going to ask ‘you and what army?’ but since the answer would clearly be ‘the Marines,’ I’ll let that one stand.”

“You’re not going anywhere. I’m just getting started with you.” He slid her down just a little, then did some fancy leg work so that she rested on her side, her back to the back of the sofa, their faces an inch apart. He blocked her from rolling off the couch with his own body. “I’m not letting you get away that easily.”

“You look at me the way you do,” she said, tracing a finger over one of his brows, then the other, “and you say the things you say, and you make me feel not so much . . .”

“What?” he asked, his voice all but a rumble in his chest.

“Not so alone out here.”

As if that were the answer he’d looked for himself, his eyes glowed hot an instant before his mouth came down over hers. He rotated them once more, so she lay flat on her back, and all that kept his weight from pressing into her were his elbows and one knee. The man was a master at the ground work. He should have been an MMA fighter instead.

Wrapping her arms around his neck, she pulled him more firmly to her. “I want to feel you,” she whispered. He shook his head and tried to prop himself back up, but she nipped his lip. “I’m not a flower, I won’t get crushed. Please. I need to feel you.”

Tentatively, he rested his body more fully on hers. Oh, God, she needed that. Needed to feel the full weight of him across every inch of her. The hard, thick length of his every pound of muscle pushing at her softness was so delicious she moaned into his mouth. He returned the sound with a groan of his own, pressing his thick erection into the cleft between her legs before letting his tongue sweep in.

He tasted like the ice cream they’d had after dinner, and his hands rasped over her skin as he pushed her tank top up to sit right below her breasts. It took everything she had not to suck in her stomach, to flex, try to make it feel flatter as his fingers traced over her torso.

But if he noticed she wasn’t exactly a thin lady, he didn’t seem to mind. With every stroke of his fingers, calloused tips rasping over her skin, he seemed to thicken against her thigh more. One thumb brushed just under the wire edge of her bra, but no more. It was as if he were teasing them both, holding out until they were nearly burning with the urge to touch everywhere.

She was thirty seconds away from unhooking her own damn bra when he sat back, relieving her of his weight entirely. She blinked up at the ceiling, jarred from the quick movement. “What . . .”

Greg stood, on what looked like not-so-sturdy legs, and did a quick once around the living room. She noticed while his back was turned, he shook out his right leg more than once . . . to relieve the pressure against his erection, she assumed.

“What happened?”

“Nothing,” he said quickly, back still turned to her.

“Then get back here. You changed the channel right when it was getting good.”

“I want to, but I won’t.” He said it through strained vocals, like he was talking around a lump in his throat. He cleared it, then faced her. The massive bulge in front was impossible not to stare at. “Eyes up here, Robilard.”

Without even a blush, she met his gaze. “You’re not going to tell me you don’t want me, right?”

“No. And from the way your high beams are flashing, I know you’re feeling the same way.”

She instinctively reached down to cover her breasts, then realized there was no point. So she brushed her tank top down and hoped to look nonchalant about the whole thing as she sat up. “Is there something the matter?”

“I’m just thinking,” he said, and started to pace, “that maybe we’re not ready for this step yet.”

“Second base,” she said dryly. “We’re not ready for second base.”

“You don’t have to say it like that.” His voice, like his gaze, was dark and not altogether friendly.

“Greg,” she said with a sigh, “there are high schoolers who move on to second base faster. I know you’ve got your training schedule, and that keeps you busy. And I’ve got work, and all the weirdness that goes with that. But I thought . . .” She held up her hands, then let them fall again. “I thought we were past that. Aren’t we past that?”

“It’s not you . . .” he started, and she stiffened. He rushed over to kneel in front of her just before she could stand. “Stop. Don’t move.”

“If you finish that sentence with, ‘. . . it’s me,’ I will punch you,” she warned. “I’ve been watching you guys practice. I could put some heat behind it.”

He snorted, but did his best to keep his face straight. Other than a slight twitch at the corner of his lips, he managed it. “I wasn’t. Hear me out?”

She waited a moment, just to make him sweat. But then she settled back into the couch cushions and put her hands in his when he held his out. “It better be good. I dried my hair for this, you know.”

“I know, and it looks beautiful.” He started to speak again, then just leaned in and kissed her once more, on the lips. “I needed that.”

It amused her that he took the kiss like another man might take a shot of bourbon just before doing something unpleasant. For courage, or for encouragement, maybe.

“I’m not great at this whole . . . thing. This slow build to a relationship.”

Neither was she, clearly, but she let that pass.

He ran one hand over his short hair in a gesture so obviously self-frustrated, she wanted to tell him it would be okay. But that would be helping, and he didn’t want help, so she waited.

“I don’t want to mess this up. I wasn’t sure if I even wanted to be on the team, but now I am. And I wasn’t sure I wanted to tangle with a woman, but I do. And I wasn’t sure I wanted that woman to be you, but she is, and I’m glad, but it’s fucking terrifying.”

Maybe some women wouldn’t be impressed with a speech that included the word fucking but for her, for Greg, for that moment, it was raw and real and it was the exact right thing she needed to soothe her nerves. She cupped his face in hers and kissed him, long and hard, so he knew where her head was. “I get it . . . I think. You want to make sure that we don’t move so fast that we burn out physically before we reach the next step emotionally.”

“No,” he breathed. Then, “I mean, yes.”

“Poor guy,” she murmured, rubbing her lips over his. “This has you all twisted up, doesn’t it?”

He grumbled something adorably grouchy.

“Can I tell you a secret?”

He nodded, their noses bumping.

“It has me pretty twisted up, too.”

When his shoulders dropped, just a fraction of an inch, she knew she’d worked her way into that soft spot she’d been searching for the whole time. Not sure how much longer he’d keep it exposed, she added, “I’m not all that brave at this. Combination of reasons, I guess. But I’m willing to open myself up more, if you are, too.”

He nodded an agreement, kissed her again.

“So, are we the real deal?”

“Hell yeah, we are.” Greg kissed her, pulling her against him so that her knees were spread wide and her crotch pressed to his stomach. “But we’re still not going to second base tonight.”

“Maybe before the homecoming dance,” she teased, and let him kiss her again.

*   *   *

REAGAN inched forward in line to pass through the front gates, doing her best not to glare at the steadily growing number of protestors. The first day, it had been maybe four or five families plus a few more single people. No more than a dozen, total. Today, the head count was probably closer to fifty.

She snail-crawled past a mother with three kids, the youngest in a stroller. The youngest held up a sign written on what looked like construction paper. Clearly, he hadn’t written it himself, as he was probably no more than two. But the sight of that child holding up a sign saying “Fighters go to hell,” made her stomach drop.