Duty and Desire: Military Erotic Romance Read online

  With my heart beating hard against my chest, I struggled with my boots, flipping them over the seat, and then tossed back my pants. The bikinis I dropped to the floorboard—in case I needed them in a hurry.

  Haddox pulled the car onto the shoulder of the road, slid back his seat, then urged me over his lap. “This what you were after?”

  I reached between us and set the tip of his cock at the entrance of my vagina. “I owe you.”

  “You don’t owe me a damn thing.” His hands gripped each side of my hips and held me still. “Why me? Why now?”

  “We’re stateside. Not breakin’ any laws.”

  “Beg your pardon, but I can think of a few.” He leaned toward me and rooted through my T-shirt until his mouth latched onto a nipple. He bit it. “First stateside fuck? Not buying it.” He nipped it again, harder.

  I gasped and dug my fingers into his close-cropped hair. “I want you, Haddox.”

  “Mason. We’re gonna fuck—call me Mason.”

  “Mason, I want you. Have for the longest, but you had a girl. I wouldn’t do that to another woman. Not when she couldn’t be there to fight for you.”

  He released my breast. “You divorced your husband when he was deployed.”

  “He cheated.”

  He grunted, centered me again and slid me down his cock, his fingers biting into my hips as he controlled the slow glide. “Man was a damn fool.”

  “It happens. We were apart too damn long.”

  “I waited.”

  “So did I. But I’m not bitter.” I squeezed my pussy around him. “Dammit, let me move.”

  His grip eased, and his hands slid up the inside of my shirt and under my bra. His fingers were hard but caressed me gently, massaging me as I began to move.

  “When did it get dark?” I murmured, clutching his shoulders. Despite the tight confines and the steering wheel rubbing my back, I rose and fell, slowly at first, then faster, watching the last glimmer of the setting sun as it burned against the horizon.

  His breaths deepened. He pinched my nipples and pulled them, letting them go, then pulled them again. Excitement cramped my belly, slicked my channel and his dick.

  His eyelids dipped, and he shoved up my shirt to watch as he continued to torture my breasts. The tips extended, and he twirled them between his fingers.

  I plunged down his cock again. “Mason,” I gasped.

  “Do you know what I’m gonna do to you first motel we find?”

  “Jesus, what?” I said, lunging down and settling against him to rub my clit against his pelvic bone and wiry curls.

  “Tie you to it. Then lick you from your toes to your tits and back down. Might leave a mark or two along the way.”

  I smiled. “Haven’t had a hickey since high school.”

  “Ever been spanked?”

  I tilted my head. “Wanna use your belt on me?”

  “Fabric doesn’t sting as much as leather. Will that be enough for you, wildcat?”

  I laughed. “Think so. And I like it doggie-style. Rattle the bed when you fuck me.”

  “I can manage that. If we can get food delivered, I might not want to leave the bed for a week.”

  I groaned. “Seems just about long enough.”

  “To make up for no sex for a year?”

  “To get to know you.”

  Mason blew out a deep breath, then pushed back my hair. “You know me, Megan,” he whispered. “You knew I couldn’t be alone today.”

  “Then maybe it’ll be long enough for you to know me.”

  “Oh, I know you. I called you a wimp when you were scared. Got you riled enough to gun it and run that truck through the barricade. I wanted to kiss you when we made it back to camp.”

  His cock crowded through swollen tissue. I bit my bottom lip as I savored the stretch. “Really?”

  “Yeah, but Marla was still part of my life, or so I thought.”

  I wrinkled my nose. “And it would’ve been breakin’ the rules.”

  “That too.” He cleared his throat. “Think we might finish this up before some cop comes drivin’ by and arrests both our naked asses?”

  “Don’tcha think he’d give two soldiers home from war a break?”

  “Maybe, but I’m not in the mood to have to flash him my own badge, and I don’t want anyone seein’ your ass but me.”

  I rose and fell, squeezing my pussy hard, making double damn sure he knew I wasn’t going to rush a minute of my first Mason-induced orgasm. “When we wrap up this week in bed, will I see you again?”

  “Think I need a war to know I need this—and you?”

  “A girl likes to know she’s more than a fuck, Mason.”

  “Baby, I do believe you’re gonna be my favorite fuck.”

  I rammed down his cock and held still, glaring daggers at his sly smile.

  His gaze held mine as he fit two fingers into the top of my folds and rubbed my clit, toggling back and forth.

  My whole body shivered, and I gave a whimper.

  “Can’t resist it, can you? Gonna do what I ask, baby? Gonna come for me now?”

  I closed my eyes and rocked forward and back, grinding against him, building friction, getting wetter and wetter. When he leaned toward me and kissed my mouth, I cried out and burrowed my tongue into his mouth, tasting him fully for the first time as waves of hot and cold pleasure rippled through me.

  I vibrated on his cock, squeezing, releasing, and then his thighs tensed beneath me, and he shoved up then down, tunneling deeper, stroking in and out until, at last, he shuddered and his whole body tightened. Come spurted deep inside me, and I gave quick thanks to the fact I was still on the pill. Neither of us was ready for complications.

  His mouth softened beneath mine, and he rubbed his lips on mine before pulling back. “Do something for me?”

  “I already did,” I murmured.

  “Stay naked. I like the idea of you slickin’ up the leather while I drive.”

  I grinned and eased slowly off his cock. While he tucked himself back into his pants and changed gears to pull out onto the highway, I sat beside him, my thighs slightly parted to let them dry.

  He placed a hand between my legs, and two fingers slipped into my pussy. “Any complaints?” he asked, his smile digging a dimple into one cheek.

  I flipped back my hair, snuggled my back into the leather and closed my eyes. “I’ll let you know, soldier.” So what if I didn’t have a toothbrush or a change of clothes? The fingers gliding through my folds were determined and sparking a second coming that had me sliding lower in my seat. I trusted him. He knew me. It was enough for now. We’d come home and neither of us wanted to be alone.

  The scrubby live oaks and cedar trees dotting the rugged hills blurred as my eyelids fell. I smiled, thinking about how I must look—tanned legs spread, T-shirt bundled under my breasts.

  His thumb rasped my swollen clit. I peeked at him. His face was turned away, but he was smiling too, and looking like a man well-satisfied with how things had gone down.

  “Are you sorry it’s me?” I asked, then instantly regretted it. I didn’t want to sound needy.

  His eyes reflected the lights from the dash when he shot me a quick glare. “I was pissed she didn’t bother to show, but when you jumped into my car, I realized I didn’t even know what color her eyes were.” He gave a snort. “Yours, sweetheart, are gold-brown with little green flecks. I’ve noticed things about your from the very start. If I hadn’t wanted you in this car, I’d have patted your butt and sent you on your way.”

  I faced forward again, satisfied that was probably the most romantic thing the man might ever tell me. I cupped my hand over the one still playing between my thighs and settled in for the long ride.

  NIGHT WITCH

  Connie Wilkins

  Far away someone played the balalaika.

  Darkness still gripped Yelena, slashed by searchlights and bursts of antiaircraft fire. Over and over she glided silently, engine cut, the only warning for the Ger
man defenses the whistling of the wind through the biplane’s wing struts—until Yevgeniya in the navigator’s cockpit released the bombs. Over and over; the silent approach, the bombs dropping, exploding, then the side-slipping her plane out of the searchlight beams and restarting the engine—but never the flight back to their base. Never escape.

  Yet now there was balalaika music. A simple tune, simply played, achingly sweet. The notes tugged at her heart, her mind, and led her at last out of darkness.

  At first all she saw was the fire in the hearth. Then the subtle movement of fingers plucking the balalaika’s strings caught her eye. Her gaze moved up along a muscular forearm to the shirtsleeve rolled tightly across the bicep, and onward to the dark head bowed over the instrument. He sat near the hearth on a low stool, and the firelight glinted on streaks of silver in his hair; but that hand, that arm, were not those of an old man.

  A dream, of course, but much more pleasant than the dark one. Often at an encampment when they could snatch some sleep she had dreamed of a small farm cottage, a hearth and perhaps even a man in the background, though visions of a simple piece of rye bread and a bowl of hot barley soup had ranked higher. Some of the girls in the all-women’s regiment talked on and on about men, while others, like Yevgeniya…

  “Yevgeniya!” Yelena struggled to sit in spite of a throbbing pain in her head. The balalaika music ceased abruptly. But the room, the fire, the man calmly rolling his shirtsleeves back down and lighting a lamp with a brand from the fire were still there. Not a dream, then.

  Now she remembered Yevgeniya calling, “Lena! Lenotchka! Can you get free?” while her hands tugged so frantically that Yelena had blacked out from the pain.

  “Yevgeniya?” She fought back panic. More memories came; the blasted wing, the plane plunging and shuddering as she struggled to keep in the air long enough to safely cross into Russian-held territory.

  “Your navigator survived the crash with only a few cuts and bruises.” He took up a walking stick that had leaned against the chimney and made his way slowly toward her. An old man after all? The lamp showed a long scar across his cheek beside his left ear, disappearing under his collar. A good face, with strong bones, lined by pain and stress rather than age. Not old, but wounded, which explained why he could be here instead of in the army with every Russian male fit to fight.

  He set the lamp on a wooden table and pulled a chair up beside the couch where she lay. “She saw my light on the hillside and came to me for help, with her handgun ready in case I should need persuading. Such a forceful girl! The Germans are wrong to call your bomber crews ‘Night Witches.’ That one is more like an avenging Valkyrie.”

  Yelena smiled at that, but asked, “Where is she now?” She felt for the handgun that should be in her flight suit pocket, and realized suddenly that she lay all but naked under a soft woolen blanket.

  “Your weapon is beside your pillow.”

  The hint of amusement in his voice dispelled her sudden fear. She restrained herself from groping for the gun.

  “Once convinced that I would not eat you, she went to find the nearest Russian troops and then to make her way to your airfield. She will send help for you if she can. She assured me, though, that you would understand her first duty is to get back into the air and drop more bombs on the invaders.”

  “So it is,” Yelena said. “And mine as well.”

  “Then mine must be to make sure you’re fit to travel and to fly. No bones broken, but your leg was badly bruised by the fuel tank that trapped you in the cockpit, and yesterday your head had a lump as big as a goose egg.” He reached out and gently lifted the russet hair away from her temple. “Tonight I think we have only a common hen’s egg to deal with.”

  Yelena’s hand went to her wound. She flinched at the soreness. There was indeed a lump, and a short gash already scabbing over. She must have bled a great deal. But… “Yesterday? How long have I been here? And how long has Yevgeniya been gone?”

  “She was off within a quarter of an hour after we brought you here.” He said it very casually, but Yelena knew he understood what she was thinking. This man had not only rescued her, even wounded as he was, but had cared for her unconscious body for at least a day and a night.

  The thought of his strong hands cleaning away the blood, removing her clothing, doing for her whatever else had been necessary, did not trouble her as much as it should have. She felt a traitorous flush rise from her chest to her cheeks, but kept her voice steady. “Then I thank you for your care of me.”

  “You would do the same for any fellow soldier of the Rodina.”

  It was true, though something in his eyes made Yelena hope that she was not just any fellow soldier to him. It could hardly matter, though, since she must indeed return to flying, and her chances of survival were less even than for foot soldiers in the Russian Army.

  The army. She struggled again to sit up, and managed it with his right arm around her shoulders. “Are we still behind our own lines?”

  “The German guns have been coming closer. One more day, perhaps.”

  There was no need to explain the danger. If the Germans found the remains of her mangled Po-2 biplane, their search for survivors would be unrelenting. No “Night Witch” had yet been captured; they had each been given handguns to assure that none ever would. Better to die that way.

  She clutched at his hand. His fingers tightened around hers. “I must get back on my feet. What should I call you?” It felt strange that she did not already know.

  “Arkady is my name. But…wait while I find something for you to wear.” He rose and turned away so quickly that she guessed he was trying to spare her embarrassment. Or, she found herself hoping, trying to keep from staring as intently as he wished.

  How had she forgotten her undressed state? Her fur-lined flight suit and wool uniform and ill-fitting army-issue undergarments were gone completely, and all that covered her was a man’s cotton undershirt that might have covered her to the hips if her movements hadn’t bunched it higher. Just the thought of his gaze on her body made her tightened nipples show clearly through thin fabric. “What has become of my own clothing?” she called after him, more to distract herself than out of curiosity.

  “Burned. And then buried. The fuel tank had leaked onto you, and there was so much blood…and to keep them here was too dangerous.”

  Of course. Yelena pulled the blanket back over her lap. This was no time for… Or perhaps it was. War topples all conventions. She was no virgin, after all. How could one deny a childhood friend going off to fight and likely never to come back? All the girls in her village had done their part. It was not until a year later that she had discovered how much more she could do for her country, when the famous aviator Marina Raskova persuaded Comrade Stalin to let her form female air regiments, with women trained in the aeroclubs so popular across the country in the last decade. Surely by now, after more than 800 bombing missions, she deserved some pleasures of her own choosing.

  Arkady could be seen through an open door rummaging through a chest at the foot of a wide bed. When he returned he brought a nightrobe of fine embroidered wool. “I don’t suppose my grandmother ever actually wore this after her wedding night, only saved it with her bridal clothes and other treasures.”

  “Lovely,” Yelena said sincerely. “I hope she wouldn’t mind letting me use it.”

  “She would call you a heroine of the Motherland, and be honored,” he said gravely, and after that she couldn’t refuse.

  When she sat decently clothed at the edge of the couch, he helped her stand erect. The bruised leg felt as though it might give way, and her head began to pound. Her first steps were unsteady, but motion strengthened her, and she walked on her own to the haven of a chair on the far side of the table.

  “Good! That deserves a reward.” Arkady took two bowls from a shelf and limped without his stick toward the iron cookstove beside the chimney. Only then did Yelena realize that the aroma of barley soup had been teasing at her sub
conscious mind. In dreams it had always come first, but now the man—and the danger—had distracted her. Even his movements, stooping to add wood to the fire, preoccupied her, and she wondered how far down past his shirt and into his loose farmer’s trousers his scar extended.

  They shared the soup, thick with carrots and onion and bits of chicken, and slices of rye bread far enough past fresh to be ideal for dipping into the broth. Yelena was suddenly so hungry that she ate much too fast and let a bite of soup-sodden bread slide down her chin. Arkady laughed, and she grinned widely, until she saw him wince and touch the scar on his face.

  “Does it hurt?” She wished she dared reach out to soothe him.

  “No, just…pulls a bit if I laugh, although I can’t remember the last time I did that. Does anyone laugh in these times?”

  “One must laugh, to prove to fate that you are alive!” This time Yelena did reach across the table to touch his face, and, after a tiny flinch, Arkady did not pull away. “You should do it as exercise, to stretch the scar tissue. And rub it with the ointment my grandmother used to make with goose grease and herbs.” She ran a finger very lightly down his wounded cheek and felt a tremor he could not suppress. She did not think pain was its cause. When her hand reached his throat he pulled it gently away, but did not let it go.

  “My grandmother never kept geese,” he said, “but she had her own home remedies.” His tone was light, though the darkened eyes fixed on hers were saying something else entirely. “Her chickens and sheep are still here, in my care, while she has gone to live in a safer area with my cousins.”

  “I expect chicken fat would do. Or lanolin from the sheep’s wool.” Yelena too was matter-of-fact, while in her imagination she rubbed ointment all along his wounds however far beneath his clothing they extended. “Proper massaging can work wonders for stiffened scars.”

  Arkady dropped her hand and stood abruptly. “You had better watch out, Lenotchka, or I will decide you make an even better nurse than pilot, and keep you here.”

  “I am a very good pilot, Arkasha,” Yelena said teasingly. Did he even realize that he had used the intimate form of her name, and she had responded in kind?