A Man Like You
"A man like you... wouldn't do this."
The words that finally slipped free had frozen stiff. She had come into the enemy's base as a spy, and still she had respected Louis with her whole heart, looked up to him. She simply could not accept that her idol—her hero—was moving in a way that did not suit him at all.
"And what, exactly, is 'like this' supposed to mean?"
Major Louis set a hand beside the bed where Sophia sat and bent at the waist. The voice he poured into her ear was far too low, and rough.
"Stop."
Sophia caught the hand gripping her chin and tried to hold him off. The large hand was hot. She registered how near his body was—broad shoulders and a hard frame hanging over her as if they might come pouring down. She could have wrenched his wrist. She could have fought with everything she had. She was free. If she began to resist him in earnest, even the formidable Major Louis would not find it easy to take her by force.
That was when a thick thigh drove in between her knees.
"Think of nothing but staying alive. There's someone you have to see, isn't there."
The instant that low whisper sank into her ear, the strength went out of the hand that had been clutching him. She ground her teeth. Had he always been this cowardly, this cruel, this shabby a man? A body like hers—she could have thrown it at him dozens of times. Hundreds.
"Where is Ella?"
Louis straightened, and his eyes met Sophia's in the air between them. Those lake-dark irises were deep. Fathomlessly deep. Beautiful eyes that did not belong to a man who had just spoken so basely.
"Then I'll be needing an answer of my own."
She deliberately spread her forced-open legs wider still, leaned her body back, and spoke slowly. The hand at her chin fell away. With a little distance between them, the man's condition came into sharper view. He was unmistakably aroused. Even through the fairly thick uniform trousers his state stood out, and the muscles of his torso swelled taut beneath his shirt.
It was a strange sight. This was the major so severely ascetic that rumors had circulated he might be impotent. The face looking down at her seemed, at a glance, as composed as ever—but Sophia could sense it. He smelled of some other male entirely.
"She's getting along about as well as you are."
"In this battalion's building?"
"Unfortunately, question time is over."
The moment the words ended, her chin was seized and her mouth was taken. The major was kissing her.
The kiss was violent. He smelled of cigarettes. A tongue pushed into the mouth that had fallen open in shock and tangled with hers, nipping and sucking. When a thin moan escaped her at the stinging ache, the movement softened all at once. The slow caress, the thick sensation of their mouths mixing, was far too stimulating. Far too obscene.
Sophia did not close her eyes. Part of her wanted to look away from what was real; part of her wanted to face it straight on. The man's long lashes were lowered in a languid droop. Then they lifted, slowly, and blue eyes showed themselves—a deep gaze fixed on her. For a moment he seemed to scoff at the combative light in her eyes. He drew back briefly, shifted the angle, and bit deep into her lips again.
At the same time a large hand pushed up beneath her T-shirt and slid inside. The feel of his palm on bare skin was stark. He was so intent she could hardly believe he was the same man who had been dry as stone.
Her spine drew tight of its own accord. A hot, hard hand. The palm, drilled and trained without number, was rough with callus, and he moved it without restraint. Sophia turned her head and set her teeth. Forced to break the kiss, his mouth traced along her ear.
Her breasts were full enough to be a hindrance every time she trained. She had always resented them. They were good for nothing but drawing tiresome flies. Had Major Louis, behind that decent, gentlemanly face, been looking her body over? Since when had he harbored lust like this? The thought sat thick and bitter.
The major went on with a caress whose intent could not be mistaken. The hand that followed her, sly and clinging, as if to stir her arousal, was excessively impure. Sophia wanted none of this sticky business.
"Just... just do it."
She caught his arm and muttered it under her breath. She wanted it over quickly. If he had come at her body panting and mindless, the way Derek had, she would have spread her legs with a sneer already on her mouth. Instead the major kissed her neck in slow, clinging passes, traced her collarbone, and obsessed over her breasts.
"Just do what?"
Louis asked it against the point of her chin, kissing her there. At the damp, soft feel of it Sophia clenched her teeth again. This was an act that ought to have been nothing but revolting, nothing but filthy—and yet every time he touched her, a current ran the length of her spine.
"We aren't playing at being lovers, are we? I'm telling you to get it over with."
Sophia glared at Louis, her eyes flashing hard. His face was close. The hand stroking lightly over her skin had not changed. Only the gaze looking down at her had gone a degree colder. A few strands of the hair always swept neatly back had fallen loose. That disordered look stirred some strange feeling in her, and she frowned all the harder on purpose.
"If you meant to make me angry, you've succeeded. Somewhat."
"I'm not wrong."
Sophia smiled crookedly.
"No. The truth always irritates people."
She decided to ignore Major Louis's remark, whose meaning she could not grasp.
"But contrary to the lieutenant's intentions, I mean to do this the way I want. Whether it's a love affair or a rape. So shut your mouth."
At the word "rape," Louis's eyes flashed cold. He looked genuinely angry. She could not understand why he wore that face over a thing he himself was doing.
The man who had gone still began to move again, rougher now than before. As his hands stripped her underwear and T-shirt upward, her breasts were bared to the air. Sophia fought not to cover herself, not to shrink from him in any passive way. She wanted only to take all of it in, steady and unshaken.
And Louis plainly did not care for her attitude. He lifted the swaying flesh, lowered his mouth, and licked. Every time that red tongue moved, tracing over her skin, a strange shiver rose.
"Ah."
Sophia shut her mouth again on the moan that had escaped her. Louis seemed to have caught that faint sound. His movements grew rougher still. Under his strength her body was driven steadily back—legs still hanging down, her upper body laid out across the bed. Louis covered her as well, all but stretched over her.
The man blanketing her entirely from above was, without question, the Major Louis she had known. And yet he was utterly strange to her. Each time a faint pleasure filled her belly at the mouth worrying her breast, Sophia deliberately turned from the sensation and tried to mock him.
"The other men would find this very amusing if they saw. The Fifth Battalion took quite an interest in you, Major."
Fortunately her voice did not shake. It even sounded cold. She wanted him to seethe at the fact that his fervent caresses drew no reaction from her at all—better still if he lost his composure. But the major only put his tongue out one last time, licked the peak at his leisure, kissed the corner of her mouth, and let out a short breath of laughter.
The hand that had been stroking her breasts again and again moved down to her trousers. Click. The sound of the hook coming undone rang as loud as thunder. White cotton panties showed, and a hot hand slipped inside them. She felt that slow movement far too well.
Sick bastard.
Sophia shoved him hard. In truth, she wanted to curse herself.