Alec Read online

  “Definitely not in public,” she retorted, trying not to let me see her panting.

  “Not at all. You’re mine.”

  “That’s debatable.”

  “Nothing is debatable about us.” I slid two fingers inside her and slowly pumped them in and out. She squirmed to close her legs, but I held them open. Not that I really could keep her like this. If she didn’t want this, she could easily break my hold.

  “You can’t keep doing this, Alec. We’re good together and I like fucking you, but we agreed that we wouldn’t go down this road again.”

  I stopped and stared at her. What did I want? I sure as hell didn’t want what we had before, but Florrie had been very clear that we were just fucking. Not that it mattered anyway. I was still fucking pissed at her for what went down. I wasn’t even sure that I could handle trying to have more with her. But it still bugged the fuck out of me.

  “Why?”

  “Why what?”

  “Why can’t you just admit that you’re mine? Hell, I know that we’re just fucking, but you can’t even bring yourself to admit what we’re really doing here.”

  “We’re fucking. That doesn’t need further explanation.”

  “But you’re only fucking me, which makes you mine. Why not just say it?”

  “Because you demand it,” she huffed, shoving her pussy forward toward my hand.

  “So, I’m good enough to fuck, but that’s it?”

  “That’s not what I said.”

  “You don’t have to. I know you. You’ll do anything to have an out.”

  “What is it you really want? Because when we started fucking the other day, it was about lust. Now you’re in a meeting, calling me yours in front of Cap and Craig. We’ve already been through all this bullshit. We’ve done that whole relationship bit where you pretend that we’re in one. It didn’t work. Why the fuck would you even hint at it again?”

  “Because I still fucking love you,” I shouted before I could stop myself. I hung my head and took a step back. It was the truth. No matter how much I tried to deny it, I had stayed away for six months, but she was never really out of my thoughts. Just one taste of her was all it took to reel me back in. I should have never fallen for it. I should have listened to Craig when he told me to back off, but I didn’t. And now I was back in the position I was in for three fucking years. I was in love with a woman that would never love me back.

  “We’re toxic to each other,” she said quietly. “You expect too much and I don’t give enough. I can see that now. We’ll never work and you know it. It doesn’t matter how much you love me or how good the sex is. We’re just not going to work.”

  “Why do you always say that? That I love you. Can you honestly say that you don’t feel anything for me?”

  “I know I feel something, but I don’t know what love feels like. I imagine that it’s something like an overwhelming feeling that suffocates you. I don’t feel that. So, I know I feel something, but it’s not enough.”

  “After three fucking years, you’ve never wanted anyone else, but you still can’t admit what I see plain as day.”

  “Alec, you have to stop. I should have known this wasn’t going to work. I knew that you would get like this, and I knew that I would push you away. I think…I think we need to end this for good.”

  “There’s nothing to end. The only thing we do is fuck, remember?”

  “It’s all got to stop. We can’t keep doing this to each other.”

  “You mean, you can’t keep screwing me over.”

  She sighed and hopped down from the ring. “When we’re done with this job, I’m going to ask to be reassigned to another team.”

  “What?”

  “It’s for the best, Alec. We have to stop this now. We’re only going to continue hurting each other. And I just can’t do that to you anymore.”

  She got dressed and walked away, leaving me standing there with my heart in my hands, bleeding out all over the fucking floor.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Florrie

  Three years ago…

  Fuck, he was so sexy. I watched Alec run the training course against some of the other guys. He wasn’t wearing a shirt, having just finished training with Knight. His biceps flexed as he climbed the wall and flung himself over the other side. His thick, muscular thighs gripped the rope as he grappled down to the floor. I blew out a long, slow breath as I continued to watch him move.

  I had never had any particular interest in Alec or Craig. They were my teammates and that was it, but lately, something was different. I noticed Alec more for some reason. Maybe it was a touch or a look. Maybe it was working with him day in and day out for so many years. It was hard to say, but even harder to watch him working out like this and not be able to touch him like I wanted.

  Not that I really could. We were teammates. Besides, I didn’t do relationships. I had never found a man that I actually wanted to be with. I had seen it happen over the years when I was in the military. Guys would fall in love with some woman back home and they would get married. Then, after coming home from a long deployment, the woman would give some excuse of how things were too hard to deal with. And it was. Life in the military sucked for a relationship.

  I went out to dinner with friends once when I was home on leave. It was uncomfortable. The husband asked if she was done going off playing G.I. Joe. He didn’t understand what point she was trying to prove. They were divorced by later that year.

  So, I never really saw the point. I wasn’t looking for anything serious anyway. When I was deployed, I basically needed someone to get my rocks off with. There was always a willing male that needed it just as much as I did. There were never any hurt feelings when we walked away because there had never been any expectations. For some reason, when I came home, I stuck with that mindset. I had just been looking to get my life back on track, and I wasn’t ready for anything more. Besides, it wasn’t like there had been any prospects that were so great that I just couldn’t walk away. I always walked away.

  But then there was Alec. The man that had somehow slipped in under the radar and made my body thrum with excitement just by being close to me. As I watched him, I wondered why not? Neither of us had any serious relationships, so maybe he would be okay with just having a fling. The only issue was work. We would have to make sure that the lines between us didn’t get blurred. This was just sex.

  “Sexy, huh?” Lola joined me in watching the men. She was already married and deeply in love. I knew that she didn’t get any kicks out of watching the other guys work out. She was onto me.

  “Well, they’re sexy men running around shirtless and I haven’t gotten laid in months, so, yeah, sexy.”

  “Mmhmm.” She didn’t believe a word I was saying. She was just waiting for me to give first, which I wouldn’t.

  “So, which one are we watching today?”

  There were several to choose from. Alec, which, of course, was the one I was watching. Then there was Craig, my other teammate. Yeah, he was fucking sexy too, but he wasn’t the one my panties were getting wet for. Jackson and Chance were also on the course. And then last, but not least, Sinner. The man was every woman’s fantasy, but lately, my eyes always drifted from him to Alec and never strayed further.

  “Take your pick.”

  “Oh, I will,” she smirked. “If it weren’t for Ryan, I’d be all over Alec.” My jaw clenched tight and I took a deep breath to keep from losing it. “I’m not sure why I never gave him a chance. He offered up a one night stand when he first started working here. It’s a shame I never took him up on it.”

  “But you do have Ryan,” I said testily.

  “I don’t know. Would it really be that bad to give him a shot?”

  “Are you fucking kidding me? You already have one man. Now you need another?”

  Lola turned to me and smirked, and my mouth dropped open. I had walked right into that and she hadn’t even put in any effort.

  “I knew it. I thought I saw
you watching him more closely lately. If you’re not going to make a move, you might want to watch your reactions. When I walked up, you were eyefucking him, and there was no chance you were looking at anyone else.”

  “Shit,” I grumbled.

  “How long has it been going on?”

  “It’s not. Let’s just say that one day I woke up and started looking at him as more than a teammate.” Quite literally.

  “Have you talked to him about it?”

  I snorted. “Yeah, because I was hoping to have my inner girl’s heart crushed and stomped all over. Oh, and then I could continue to work with him. Yeah, that’d be great. Besides, it’s just a little obsession.”

  “You never know. He might be interested.”

  “Alec has never looked at me in any way other than the woman that he works with. I’m not even sure he sees me as a woman.”

  “Well, they are a bunch of neanderthals.”

  “It’s so fucking hard in this business. You date a regular guy and the man’s a fucking wimp. No offense.”

  “None taken, but I happened to like that Ryan isn’t part of this. It gives me normal, but with my history, that’s what I needed.”

  “I don’t want a break from this. I want someone that will fit into my lifestyle. I don’t want a man that I have to protect and kick ass for. No offense.”

  “None taken.”

  “I want a man that can give as good as he gets. No offense.”

  “None taken.”

  “And I need a man that has muscles. Is Ryan ripped?”

  “Not like Alec, but he’s still got a really nice body.”

  I sighed as I stared at Alec some more. “I just wish there was a way that I could find out if he was at all attracted to me. I mean, if I knew that he had absolutely no interest, it would be so much easier to move on. Not that I’m looking for more than a good night of fucking,” I added quickly.

  “Maybe you should write him a note. I’ll make sure Cap isn’t watching,” she grinned.

  “I think I’m just destined to watch him from afar.”

  “You know, the guys are going to The Pub tonight. Why don’t we go and you can feel him out?”

  “I suppose. What are you gonna tell Ryan?”

  “Oh, he’ll be going with. There’s no way I’m going without him. I don’t need men hitting on me and then having to gently break it to them, by smashing their faces into the bar, that I’m taken.”

  “Fine, but you’re not allowed to hint in any way that I’m interested in him. If it’s meant to be, something will happen.”

  “Yeah, sometimes you have to kick fate’s ass.” Lola strutted away and I watched the swagger that she had. Her confidence seemed even stronger now that she had Ryan. Maybe I didn’t need a man in the same field as me. Maybe a regular guy would do. I looked back over at Alec and watched as he wiped down his face and chest with a towel. Yeah, a regular guy just wouldn’t do.