Grateful for a conversation that wasn't laced with sexual undertones, he chuckled as he recalled how fierce and formidable Jon, Ben, and Kevin had looked as they backed him up. From the moment they'd been assigned to the same unit, it had always been that way with them, a strong, united front all the way. In good times and in bad.
A smile pulled at the corner of his mouth as he stared at her lovely face. "What can I say? Old habits die hard. For all of us."
She tipped her head to the side. "Once a marine, always a marine?" she guessed.
He nodded. "In a lot of ways, yes."
She was standing so close, the urge to reach out and caress his fingers along her soft cheek, down the side of her neck, and across the full swells of her breasts pushing against her top nearly overwhelmed him. Instead, he slid the tips of his fingers into the front pockets of his jeans, which forced him to keep his hands to himself.
"Well, all that fuss over me at Nick's wasn't necessary," she told him, her voice vibrating with feminine confidence. "I could have handled that guy on my own."
He raised a brow at her claim, though he couldn't help but approve of, and be attracted to, that fiery independence of hers. Couldn't help but imagine how all that bold self-assurance would be a huge turn-on in the bedroom. "You think so?"
"I know so. I deal with jerks like that all the time at The Electric Blue." The impudent smile on her lips made Joel grin, too. Then her lashes fell to half-mast as she stepped toward him, placed a hand on his chest, and slowly, brazenly stroked her palm down to his abdomen, leaving a trail of burning desire in its wake. "On the other hand, it was kind of nice having a big, strong man like you staking his claim."
He curled his hands into tight fists, even as his dick throbbed to life when he considered just how close her fingers were to his fly. "Is that what I did?" he asked, his voice rough with arousal. "Stake a claim?"
"Yeah." Her sweet, tempting mouth held a delectable curve of humor and sensuality. "And just for the record, it was a tad barbarianlike."
"Can't say I'm sorry."
"Me, either," she admitted, and shifted closer so that her mouth was only inches away from his and invited his kiss. Her hand, still splayed low on his belly, seared his skin through his T-shirt. "I've never had any guy come to my defense the way you did," she said softly.
"Not even your ex-fiancé?"
Her eyes widened in startled surprise at his abrupt comment. She dropped her hand and took a step back, giving him breathing room that no longer contained her warm, enticing female scent, which was wreaking havoc with certain parts of his anatomy.
Her brows creased in confusion and curiosity as she stared at him. "How do you even know I had a fiancé?"
It was an easy enough question for him to answer. "You wrote to Zach while he was in the service, and we talked about our siblings and what was going on back home. He happened to mention your engagement, though I don't know the specifics of your breakup." And right now seemed like a great time to discuss something that would cool his ardor. "What happened?"
She shrugged, as if her broken engagement no longer mattered to her heart or her emotions, and Joel hoped that was true. "Soon after I accepted Brent's proposal, I moved into his place with him. I figured since we were getting married anyway it made sense that we cut costs and live together, instead of paying for two apartments."
She looked away, providing Joel with a silhouette of her profile and the way she absently stroked her tongue across her soft bottom lip before speaking again. "A few months after that, Brent starting acting strange. He'd pick fights with me over ridiculous things, like me taking up too much room in his closet, or if I cooked something he didn't like, and even the way I folded his clothes. I honestly thought it was because he was having a hard time adjusting to living with someone when he'd always lived on his own and that we'd eventually find some kind of balance."
"Except you obviously didn't," Joel said.
"No, we didn't." She glanced back at him. A faint smile touched her lips and her hands tugged on the ends of the scarf wrapped around her neck. "Things just got worse. Brent grew distant and started spending more time at work, and he'd even take off for a weekend, claiming it was for the ad agency he worked for."
Joel knew exactly where all those classic signs were heading, but he didn't say anything, just listened to her tell the story her own way.
"The stupid arguments we had, and Brent's behavior, reminded me exactly of the way my own parents' marriage started disintegrating, then eventually fell apart. I was only twelve at the time, but I remember it all so vividly. Having lived through my father's infidelity and what it did to my mother, I emotionally prepared myself for what I knew was coming. And it did."
She wrapped her arms around her stomach and exhaled a deep breath. "Six months after I agreed to marry Brent, he finally broke down and admitted that he'd been seeing someone else on the side for the past three months. And if that wasn't enough of a blow, he also told me that she was pregnant and he planned to marry her."
"Jesus, Lora." He scrubbed a hand along the late-evening stubble on his jaw, hating that some prick had treated her so badly. "I'm so sorry."
Her chin lifted, showing him that gutsy, defiant spirit that never failed to impress him. "You know what? I'm okay now. Better than okay," she added as a light breeze ruffled through her silky, unbound hair. "At the time I was devastated, but I wasn't about to be defeated. And I wasn't about to repeat my mother's mistakes by wallowing in regrets and wishing for something that wasn't meant to be."
He didn't know many women, if any, that could survive such a painful breakup and be stronger for the experience, instead of angry and bitter. Only someone as stubborn and determined as Lora could push forward with such a positive outlook and attitude, he thought with an internal smile.
"What about you, Joel?" she asked, turning the tables on him with a not-so-coy grin. "How many hearts have you broken over the years?"
"None," he replied easily, and honestly.
She gave him a dubious look that was tempered by the playful gleam in her eyes. "Oh, come on, Romeo. I find that hard to believe."
Now that she was standing far enough away, he pulled his hands from his pockets and folded his arms over his chest. "Let me rephrase that. I've never intentionally broken anyone's heart," he said, not wanting her to think that he was the type of guy to string a woman along with false expectations. "The women I've dated know right up front what I'm willing to give to a relationship."
Tipping her head to the side, she eyed him curiously. "And what's that?"
He shrugged and gave her the truth. "A good time, in and out of the sack."
"But no emotional ties," she murmured, more to herself than to him. "You like to play it safe."
It both amazed and annoyed him how effortlessly she'd nailed his MO, when he was normally very guarded when it came to the opposite sex. It was an unsettling feeling knowing that Lora could get into his psyche so easily, and it made him realize how important it was that she understood his own personal rules when it came to women and relationships.
"I'm straight up with women about what to expect because I don't want anyone to get hurt when I'm ready to walk away." And he always did. Either he grew restless and bored with the affair, stifled by constraints, or some woman would get it into her head that she was the one who could domesticate him. All three situations were clear signs that it was time for him to move on.
"What made you so jaded?" she asked, her gentle, caring voice reaching out to him like a physical caress.
He ignored the sensation, as well as the all-too-knowing tenderness that softened her features and seemed to see past all those internal barriers he'd erected long ago. "I'm not jaded," he said, but knew that denial was a lie. He'd learned at a very young age that it was so much simpler, and less painful, not to open himself up to any kind of emotional involvement, and it was a lesson that had served him well ever since.