A Few Good Men

There. There he was. Standing by the dunes some hundred feet up, his tail wagging a million miles a minute. She moved closer, thinking he might have found a bird’s nest or a crab or other small animal.

Then she saw him.

The man in fatigues who was crouched down petting the retriever.

Sara’s heart hiccupped in her chest.

Andy…

How many times had she dreamed scenes like this? Of Andy popping back up into her life as if he’d never been gone? As if he’d never shipped out to serve first in Afghanistan and then later in Iraq? Too many to count. But none of them had ever been this vivid. This real.

The man spotted her and gave Truman a final pat before rising to his feet. The heart that had hiccupped now surged up into her throat, threatening to choke her. She wasn’t losing her mind. There was a man there. A man in fatigues. But it wasn’t Andy. On closer inspection, he looked nothing like her late husband.

Where Andy had been short and stocky, this man was tall and lean, although no less powerful. Where Andy had had blond hair, this man’s close-cropped cut was dark. Where Andy had always been ready with a smile, this man had frown lines etched deep into his striking face.

Sara’s footsteps slowed and then stopped altogether three feet from him, shimmering need pooling low in her stomach.

“Hi, Sara,” Eric Armstrong said, the greeting nearly lost in the sound of the surf. “Or should I say Samantha?”

Chapter 3

ERIC STOOD STOCK-STILL, staring into Sara’s confused face, watching emotions slide like clouds across the setting sun. When she hadn’t immediately returned to her house, he’d shadowed her footsteps, following her to the beach. There, he’d found her hugging her arms around her slender body, looking so small against the endless sea that he wanted to encircle her with his own arms.

Now, her lips popped open, as if needing to say something, but without the words to say it.

God, he’d never really realized how tantalizing her mouth was before. How downright naughty. Her lips were provocatively full, the upper larger than the lower. He couldn’t seem to drag his gaze from them, wanting to trace the lines with his tongue.

The minute he’d come face-to-face with Sara, she’d stopped being merely “Samantha” or Andy’s widow…she’d become a woman to whom he felt an irresistible attachment. With whom he’d joined virtual hands when he’d most desperately needed human touch.

The waves crashing against the beach mimicked the need surging within him.

“Eric…”

The wind snatched the softly said name from her even as he leaned forward to claim what it seemed he’d been waiting his entire life to have.

Her lips were moist and cool, the tang of seawater only adding to their appeal. Eric groaned and curved his hand around to the back of her neck, pulling her closer, demanding a deeper meeting. Sara complied, parting her lips to allow him to plunder the depths of her mouth with his tongue.

It was both the greatest pleasure he’d ever known and the greatest torture. He wanted to follow the desire in him to its natural conclusion, to fulfill all that he’d dreamed about over the past six months, the thoughts of which had kept him alive, and claim Sara body and soul right there on the beach. But he couldn’t. Not because it was a public place and the act would be behavior unbecoming, but because while he tasted the sea on her lips, he became aware of the tang of salt from another source: her tears.

Eric groaned and broke contact, drawing her into his arms instead. She snaked her hands so that they grasped his shoulders from behind, her face tucked into his chest.

“God, oh, God, Eric…I’m so, so sorry. This…you and me…” She drew back.

He marveled at the dampness in her eyes glistening like the stars beginning to emerge on the eastern horizon. “I should never have contacted you. Should never have let things get out of hand…”

“Shh. We don’t have to talk about that now.” Eric found it impossible to swallow past the dryness of his throat. “I just want…need to hold you right now. Please. Just for a little while.”

Her response was instant and complete. She burrowed further into his chest, her hip resting against his arousal. Eric closed his eyes and rested his chin on the top of her sweet-smelling head. In that one moment, he knew that if the option were offered him, he’d sell his soul to the devil in order to remain like this with Sara forever.

AN HOUR LATER BACK at her house, Sara felt as if she was violating some sort of unwritten code. Against her better judgment, she’d invited Eric in. He now sat in the old wood rocker next to the cold fireplace, holding a beer in his hands, the chair looking comically too small to hold his large frame.

She’d forgotten how big he was. Much larger than Andy had been. He seemed to fill every corner of the house with his presence. Something lost not even on the dog; the golden retriever lay at Eric’s boots, his head on his paws while his watery eyes watched his every move in case there was another pat in the offing.

“I…I think the pasta must be done,” Sara said quietly, breaking the silence that had settled between them.

She couldn’t have ducked out of the room more quickly had there been a pack of coyotes nipping at her heels. It wasn’t until she was alone in the kitchen again that she allowed herself a deep breath that did nothing to steady her.

What was he doing here?

She leaned a shoulder against the refrigerator, having imagined Eric’s return countless times in her dreams. Her fantasies, really. Harmless musings that found him claiming her mouth the way he had on the beach and much, much more.

Of course, she’d never intended for them to come true. Had been convinced that she’d done a good job covering her cyber tracks.

How had Eric found out it was her? Was it something she’d said along the way? Oh, God, had he known all along?

“I think I have you figured out,” Eric had written three months ago.

Sara’s fingers had hovered over the keyboard, afraid to respond, wondering if she should shut down, pretend she hadn’t heard what he’d said. She hadn’t wanted it to be over. Needed for exchanges between her and Eric to continue for as long as she could safely arrange it.

“There’s a bad girl lurking within you, Samantha. And I want to tempt her out.”

She’d relaxed when he’d used her alias. He hadn’t been talking about her real identity at all, but responding to her sometimes-raunchy posts about what she’d like to do to him if they were in the same room together.

“Sara?”

The sound of Eric’s voice behind her nearly made her jump out of her skin.

The pasta!

She forced herself to take the pan from the burner and emptied the contents into a colander in the sink, following with a burst of cool water to cease the cooking process. No matter that her fingers burned from where she’d left the metal handle over the heat, her mind kept marrying the contents of their e-mails to each other with the fact that they now were in the same room.

And damn her wanton soul, she wanted to act out on every one of those cyber fantasies. Her favorite of which had taken place right here in this room.

“How can I help?” Eric asked.

His voice sounded right behind her, too close, too intimate.

The bottom dropped out of her stomach, making her feel oddly weightless. She turned to ask him to wait in the other room until she finished, to tell him that she couldn’t think when he was this close…and found herself unable to say anything at all.

He stood with his hands jammed into the pockets of his fatigues as if trying to keep them from doing something else. The saying, “idle hands are the devil’s play-things,” rang through her mind…and immediately trailing it was, I want to be that bad girl.

She stepped the few inches necessary to bring her within touching distance, raking her gaze over his fine, male physique. Damn, but marines had to be the sexiest guys on earth. Raw, solid muscle and deadly intent. And if she was correct, Eric had just put her directly in his sights.

Sara leaned in to kiss him, possessed by a flash of desire to yank fantasy into mind-blowing reality. He didn’t hesitate to return her kiss, his groan reaching inside to a place she’d long forgotten about. A place that had been hollow, empty, for much too long and now clamored for attention, demanded to be filled. Pure, unadulterated need zinged through her veins. She tugged his khaki shirt from his waist and he sucked in his stomach to help her. Finally, her fingers were touching the rippling waves of his muscles. Hot, so strong. Her mouth watered and she kissed him more deeply even as he hauled her sweatshirt up and off, barely breaking contact before she melted against him again, flesh against flesh.

She wanted to feel all of him…now.

She couldn’t seem to take his belt off fast enough, and the same applied with him and her jeans. Finally, they each abandoned their efforts and focused on their own clothing until nothing separated them but unwanted air.

Sara knew a heartbeat of pause as she stared at the exquisite male specimen in front of her. Eric could easily have been carved from granite, standing at least six-three without a cell of unwanted weight on him anywhere. His prime physical condition made him virtually ageless even though she knew he was thirty.

He seemed to be asking with his gaze alone if she was sure she wanted to do this. That even now if she wanted to turn back, he would. The knowledge made her grateful…and all the more determined to have him…

SWEET JESUS, SHE WAS everything and more than he’d imagined.

Eric wrapped his arms around the hotly naked woman who stepped closer to him. She was soft and warm where he was cold and hard. And she smelled better than any-one had the right to. A bit of lavender with the tangy scent of the sea.

And her mouth…dear Lord, her mouth was the thing of which dreams were made.

He couldn’t have been more surprised when Sara had stepped into his arms. He could have sworn she’d been about to throw him from the kitchen. Ever since they’d returned from the beach, she’d been antsy and uncomfortable in his presence.

Then she’d turned and kissed him and he’d forgotten about everything he’d wanted to say to her and focused on everything he’d been waiting to show her instead.

Every moment of every long night of the past six months were packed into his kiss. If he could devour her, he would. She tasted like salvation and pure temptation combined. Her tongue was merciless, dipping in and out of his mouth so that he felt like he was chasing it, chasing her. He raised his hands to rest on either side of her head and held her still, breaking contact briefly to stare deep into her eyes, and then leaning in for another taste. She clutched his wrists in her hands.

The two of them stood there, completely naked, just kissing for a time Eric was helpless to measure. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been with a woman, much less only kissed her when he could be doing much more.

She made a small sound at the back of her throat and he smiled, finally moving his hands from her head to her shoulders, and then down over the hot silk of her back.So long…so graceful. He pressed his fingers along the line of her spine, following it down to the high swell of her bottom. Then farther still, dipping into the shallow crevice inward until he probed her swollen womanhood from behind. He was surprised to find her so wet, so ready.

He groaned and picked her up. She automatically curved her legs around his hips, sandwiching his erection between her engorged labia. He turned her toward the kitchen island and sat her down, resisting the urge to enter her to the hilt right then and there. Instead, he reached for his discarded pants and took out the single condom there.

“I’m…I’m on the pill,” she whispered into his ear before he sheathed himself.

He pulled back slightly to look at her.

“I…I never stopped taking it.” She licked her lips, her pupils dilated so that her eyes were nearly black with need.

He kissed her deeply…and still sheathed himself. Confusion registered on her face.

“My dad always told me that you should always protect a lady,” he said.

She opened her mouth to protest as he hauled her hips closer to him until she was on the edge of the counter and entered her.

Whatever words she might have uttered were eclipsed by a soft gasp. Her eyelids fluttered closed and she arched her body, sensation appearing to take over. He helped her lie back against the counter. Eric’s blood surged double time, her immediate response to their joining heightening his own reaction.

He’d waited so damn long for this. Too long. He planned to take his time getting to a destination that he had only dreamt about.

He grasped her hips and withdrew, wondering at the sight of his tanned, rough skin against her pale softness. She clasped his wrists and wriggled against him, hungry for what he’d only given her a taste of. He sank into her to the hilt again, gritting his teeth to keep from coming too soon.

She felt so good. Hot, wet, inviting.

“Please,” she whispered, moving her head from side to side. “Please make love to me…”

And he did…

Chapter 4

SARA ROLLED OVER IN bed, pressing herself against the warm body next to her.

“Andy...”

It was a dream she’d had a thousand times before. Of waking up next to her husband…only to find he wasn’t there. And she always cried.

But this was the first time someone actually comforted her.

“Shh.” Arms encircled her.

Sara burrowed her nose against a rock-hard chest, clutching to the impenetrable wall that could protect her from everything. Her grief, her fears, the world.

Then she realized whose arms held her. And what name she’d said in her half sleep.

She rolled quickly away from Eric, the night before rushing back in snippets of sweaty flesh, soft cries and red-hot passion.

“I’m sorry,” she said, reaching for her robe.

“Don’t be. I miss him, too.”

She looked over her shoulder at him. He looked so damn sexy lying against the pillows, the top sheet draped dangerously low across his hips.

“Yes, but I don’t think you’ll be calling anyone else by his name.”

He glanced away, and she glimpsed the pain he must be feeling but was trying to hide.

“I’m going to be late for work,” she said.

“It’s Saturday.”

“I work Saturdays.”

Liar. Worse, she suspected he knew that. They’d talked about their hours during their many conversations and she’d complained about the nine-to-five grind and how she wished she could work from home with flex hours because sometimes she was best inspired during her time off.

Truman came in, toenails clicking against the wood floor, tail wagging, tongue lolling.

“I’ll make breakfast and take Tru for a walk,” Eric offered.

“I don’t eat breakfast and I’ll take care of Truman,” she countered.

She gathered the clothes she needed and headed for the bathroom. Before closing the door, she turned to look at where he still lay, grinning at her as if he hadn’t a care in the world.

Her heart skipped a beat.

Neither of them said anything for a long moment. Sara watched as the smile slid from his face.

He cleared his throat and propped himself up on his elbows, almost causing the sheet to drop lower. “Would you like me to leave?”

“Yes.”

ERIC FELT LIKE HE’D taken a rifle butt to the gut.

Last night…well, last night had been one of the best nights he could remember experiencing in a long, long time. Merely holding Sara postsex and listening to her soft snores had made him feel more of a man than the past five years in the service.

Of course, her calling out Andy’s name this morning he could have done without.

He ignored the pain that made it almost impossible to breathe, trying to conjure up a response.

Sara’s brow wrinkled. “Did you just expect to stay here your entire leave?” she asked.

Yes, he realized, he had. They’d made such a connection that despite the considerable obstacles they faced, he’d assumed that once she let him into her house, she’d let him in all the way.

How wrong he’d been.

He scratched the back of his head and stripped the sheet off, moving to sit on the side of the bed. He noticed the way she watched his movements, especially a particular area of his anatomy with which she’d become quite intimately acquainted the night before, yet now apparently appeared embarrassed to see.

“I don’t get it,” he said under his breath. “You’re like a faucet alternately running hot and then cold.”

“Would you prefer lukewarm?”

“I prefer a consistent temperature.”

“Sorry if I’m not made of metal with knobs you can adjust.” She picked up his clothes with jerky movements and tossed them to the bed. His T-shirt hit the side of his head and stayed there so that he had to drag it off.

“What did you think when I disappeared from the Internet?” she asked, giving up her efforts and stopping to stare at him. “That I was playing hard to get? That if you showed up on my front step I’d throw open the door and welcome you into my bed?”

Her cheeks pinkened at her words. Eric didn’t speak the obvious because both of them knew that in the end, that’s exactly what she’d done.

“I don’t need…” She gestured with her hand. “Want any of this, Eric. I’m not up for a relationship with anyone, much less my late husband’s best friend.”

“So you’d rather continue to play the role of grieving widow?”

“What?” she whispered. What color had seeped into her cheeks drained out.

Eric sighed and ran his hand over his close-cropped hair. “That didn’t come out the way I meant it to.”

“Well, what way would you have preferred it to come out? Because from where I stand, there aren’t very many ways to mean what you just said.”

“Then let me take it back.”

She shook her head slowly back and forth. “You should know that you can’t put the bullets back in the gun after they’ve been shot.”

“Damn it, Sara.” Eric stood up and faced her.

She turned away. “Please…just go.”

She disappeared into the bathroom and he was left with little alternative as the door clicked closed behind her.

Truman’s soft whine brought his gaze down to the questioning canine.

“You think you’re confused?” he asked the mutt.

He got dressed, gathered his things and headed for the front door, Truman following his every move.

SARA CLEARED the dinner plates from the dining-room table and brought in the apple pie she’d made from scratch. Her father-in-law had moved his chair back to make more room for his expanding stomach and rubbed the area in question, a satisfied smile on his face, while her mother-in-law stood in front of the banquet against the wall, picking up the photos there as she did every time she visited. Nearly every shot contained Andy. On the first vacation together in Colorado, their first anniversary, Christmas with the in-laws…every photo marked a moment in their lives that would never be repeated.

“We had a surprise visitor yesterday,” Gertrude said, putting down a shot of Andy and Truman as a puppy.

“Oh?” Sara used the server to cut the pie and picked up a dessert plate.

“Eric Armstrong dropped in as if he’d parachuted from a C-150.”

“C-130,” Howard corrected.

Neither of them seemed to notice that Sara had dropped half a piece of pie onto the white tablecloth.

Gertrude turned from the banquet. “You remember Eric, don’t you?”

“Sure, I remember him.” If they only knew that she had memories to draw on that were much more recent than their own.

Howard picked up his fresh fork to dig into the pie. “He said he stopped by here to pay his respects.”

Gertrude looked at him. “You didn’t tell me that.”

He shrugged. “Didn’t think I had to. He was Andy’s best friend. He was there when he went down. Of course he’d want to see his widow.”

“Yes, but why didn’t you tell me?”

Sara was glad the two were too occupied with each other to see her reaction to the news that Eric had told them he’d stopped by there.

She tried to stop her hands from shaking as she handed Gertrude her pie.

“You’re not going to have any?” she asked.

“No, no, I’m…” She swallowed hard. “I must have eaten too much pot roast.”

“You didn’t eat any at all. Howard ate enough for all three of us.”

He chuckled, his mouth full of pie.

“You’re getting too thin, Sara. Is everything okay? You barely eat when we go out, your clothes are at least one size too big, if not two.”

Howard looked at her. “She looks all right to me.”

Gertrude gave an eye roll. “Of course, you would say that. Men don’t notice anything until it’s waving flags in front of them…or a gun.”

“I’d notice if she’d gotten fat.”

Her mother-in-law ignored him. “Sara? You haven’t answered my question.”

“Actually, I think I will have some pie,” she said, concentrating on cutting herself a piece.

“Good,” Gertrude looked satisfied.

Problem solved. For now…

LATER THAT NIGHT she sat in front of her glowing laptop, her fingers hovering above the keyboard. There was a time not so long ago when she’d looked forward to logging on to her e-mail account and checking for new messages. Rather, she’d been eager to check “Saman-tha’s” box. But now that Eric knew who she really was, would he seek her out at her regular account? And if he did, what would she do?

“Ignore him,” she whispered.

Easier said than done.

Despite the awkward moments with her in-laws earlier, every time she turned around she was reminded of her time with Eric the other night. She hadn’t changed the sheets yet because at night she snuggled into the side he’d slept on, crushing his pillow to her nose, absorbing the scent of sandalwood and hot male.

He’d tried calling, but she’d had the answering machine on. His first two attempts he’d merely hung up. On the third, he’d left a message: “Sara, call me, please. You and I need to talk.”

What was there possibly to say? She’d made a mistake. A mammoth mistake. And while there was no taking it back, she did have a say on whether or not it continued.

Sara drew a deep breath and entered her password. She clicked on the mail button and scanned the contents. A couple of spams, an e-mail from a cousin in California and…nothing.

She squinted at the screen, sure she was seeing things.

She deleted the spam, then opened her cousin’s e-mail, which was essentially a vent about work.

“I hear you. Some days are a bitch to get through,” she wrote back. “I—”

An instant message popped up in the middle of her screen, scaring the daylights out of her.

Sara stared at a screen name she’d come to know very well over the past few months.

Armstrong3001 had written a simple: “Hey.”

She swallowed hard, trying to decide whether she should respond or to shut down the feature.

Before she knew that’s what she was going to do, she typed back: “Hey, yourself.”

She sat staring at the blinking cursor in the message box until her eyes grew dry and she had to blink.

What did Eric want? She’d been both afraid and hopeful that he would seek her out again. After the other morning, she wouldn’t blame him if he didn’t want to speak to her again. After the other morning, she was afraid she’d eagerly welcome a repeat if he offered it.

She remembered her mother-in-law holding the photo of Andy earlier and guilt settled around her shoulders like a heavy cloak.

Sara began to shut the laptop when the IM chimed and Eric’s response appeared.

“I can’t forget about the other night.”

The frank admission caught her off guard and her hand slowly dropped from the monitor as if of its own accord.