Homecoming, for a man who’d never had a home.

He watched her moving around in her kitchen. She knew it the way he knew his kit. Perfectly. Everything positioned just so. Well-organized and in perfect condition, ready for use.

Of course his kit was for whacking his country’s enemies and hers was to stun people’s taste buds, but still.

Imagine having this every day.

Imagine her in his house, every single fucking day. In his bed, every night. This beautiful creature, all grace and light, his.

He was getting ahead of himself. Down boy.

She was beautiful and smart and classy. And she was a Delvaux. No getting around that. No way would Joe ever be in a position to replicate for her what her family had given her. He loved his teammates, his bosses, his job. Or he would when he could finally do it.

But he couldn’t pretend for a second that they were this country’s elite. They were solid guys, none better. Men he’d trust with his life. But they’d never be bestselling authors or Supreme Court Justices or presidential candidates.

So what—

Joe stopped thinking when Isabel slid a plate in front of him. Pointless thinking, really, when everything looked and smelled so amazing.

He glanced up at a smiling Isabel. “Waffles? Really? You made me waffles?”

“With baked raspberry jam. One of my specialties. And I make my waffles really light. Try them.”

He cut into the stack of waffles, slightly crusty on the outside, soft on the inside and oh God, the smell. If there were awards for food smells, she’d nail it.

He kept himself from moaning by sheer grit because it wasn’t like any waffle he’d ever eaten. Light as air, with the tangy taste of that incredible raspberry jam...did she say she’d baked the jam?

Never mind. He didn’t want to analyze the magic. He finished in record time.

“That was fast,” Isabel observed. She was barefoot, in pale blue sweats that reflected her eyes, dark honey hair a little messy, no makeup. She looked more delicious than the waffles. His heart kicked once beneath his ribs, hard. “Do you want any more?”

God yes.

“Come here.” His voice sounded thick and strange even to his own ears.

She was carrying her own plate to the table when she stopped at the odd note in his voice. Then she looked him in the face, glanced down at his lap, looked up again and blushed. What he wanted was clear on his face, not to mention the huge boner nicely outlined by his thin sweats.

She walked slowly over to him. No hesitation whatsoever. If she’d hesitated, if he felt he was forcing her in any way, he’d stop.

He hoped.

She stood by his side, legs brushing his where he sat.

Sometimes Joe initiated sex like he went into battle. Deliberately, planning every move beforehand. Mapping out which items of clothing had to go first, deciding where to touch the woman and when.

Not now, oh fuck no.

Now he felt out of control, an unusual feeling and one he’d reject in any other context. Control was gone. Right now, all he wanted was to be inside Isabel, to feel her naked body against his. There was no planning, no mapping of his actions, he acted out of pure instinct and he moved as fast as he could.

First her. “These have to go,” he whispered, clutching the hem of the sweatshirt. “Up with your hands.” She stuck her hands up in the air as if he was a bank robber. He pulled the sweatshirt up and threw it off, so quickly her hair crackled with static electricity. No bra. Fantastic. His hands were shaking so he didn’t know if he could deal with little hooks and things.

She was so incredibly beautiful in the light of day. All that smooth pale skin, the large breasts on her narrow rib cage. The real deal. He’d felt every inch of them last night.

Trying to be smooth and failing at it, Joe pulled down the sweatpants, taking an incredibly lacy pair of panties down with it. She was barefoot, so all she had to do was step out of the sweats and voilà.

Gorgeous, naked woman.

Now him.

He was easy. All he had on was the sweats. Joe lifted his ass, pulled the sweats down and he was naked too.

He cleared the table with his forearm and settled Isabel on the edge, stepping between her legs.

He kissed her neck and murmured, “Eating your waffles got me hot.”

She laughed and her breasts shivered across his chest. He smoothed his hand up her long, slim thigh to her sex and touched her. She shivered. “Did watching me eat your waffles make you hot?” he asked.

Isabel’s back arched and her head fell to one side. Her neck was an erogenous zone. Joe had figured that out last night. Gotcha. He nuzzled against her neck, waves of soft hair caressing his skin. God.

“Find out,” she whispered.

He was so taken with the taste of her skin, with the feel of her hair against his face it took him a minute to understand what she meant.

Find out if I’m turned on, was what she meant.

Oh yeah.

He licked the skin behind her ear while stroking her and... yes. Watching him eat her waffles got her very hot. She was like a little furnace there, hot and juicy. He stroked her gently, slowly, pulling back to watch her face in the early morning sunlight. She glowed, like a pearl.

Joe read her face like it was a book, a book he really needed to learn, like a survivor’s manual. As he touched her, entered her with his finger, he studied her expression to see what she liked.

Her head was tilted back, eyes closed, absurdly thick eyelashes fluttering. When her face tightened he knew he was getting it right. She liked to be touched here. And here. And here.

Isabel gasped.

And there, too.

“Joe,” she whispered.

“Right here,” he whispered back.

So slick and hot, he entered her like a dream, lifting his lips from her neck to kiss her mouth, another source of warmth he could enter. Everything about her was purest magic, the feel of her smooth slim back against his hands, her soft thighs clutching his.

He moved forward, into her, kissing her deeply, his tongue imitating what he was doing to her lower body, soft and gentle.

They were making noises in the quiet of the kitchen, their bodies kissing everywhere. For a second Joe tore his mouth away from hers and looked down at where they were joined, watched himself as he pulled out then slid back into her. She looked down too. His skin was darker, rougher. Watching their bodies writhe together was the most erotic sight he’d ever seen.

They both looked up, eyes meeting, faces sober. It felt like an incredibly solemn moment, as if the very air was hesitant, expectant.

This was serious stuff. Joe felt like it was not only his dick in her, but his heart, too, beating right next to hers.

She smiled, lifted a hand to his jaw, leaned forward to kiss him with a tenderness he’d never received from anyone. His chest hurt and the only thing that could help was kissing her again, moving more deeply in her, faster, until he erupted inside her and felt her clinging to him with her arms and her mouth and her legs and her sex. Clenching hard around him as he emptied himself inside her and held her tightly afterward, almost afraid to let her go.

She was his.

* * *

There were three men making her place as secure at Fort Knox, just as Joe had said. It was amazing watching them work together. Clearly they’d worked together before. Well...yeah. They’d gone on missions where they put their lives at risk together, which is probably where they learned to work as a unit.

Exactly like a well-run kitchen with dedicated staff, only going to war instead of preparing food.

They didn’t speak much to each other as they worked, they didn’t have to. They all knew exactly what to do.

When Metal and Jacko arrived they were both carrying duffel bags and Isabel thought that they’d brought tools. But they hadn’t, they’d brought equipment. Lots of it, shiny and brand-new, high-tech and very expensive-looking.