HOSTILE: A Military Romance Novel (Military Men Book 1) by Leila Haven Page B

still refused to let me go. For a while there I thought she had fallen asleep.
     
    Until she spoke. “I’m glad I’m lost with you. I don’t think this would be bearable with anyone else.”
     
    “I’m going to get you to safety,” I promised, not for the first time and probably not for the last time either. I would go to the ends of the earth for this woman. But I would never admit that to anyone.
     
    I’d never even had thoughts like this about a woman. They were supposed to be easy fucks, clean and simple so I didn’t have to wake up next to them the next day. I’d never considered having a relationship before, never pictured myself the settling-down type.
     
    Ariana was changing everything, and I couldn’t let her. I was a soldier; I was married to the job. I couldn’t have someone waiting for me at home.
     
    It wasn’t how I worked.
     
    I couldn’t have that kind of responsibility resting on my shoulders.
     
    “I know you’re going to save us.” She was quiet again for a while. I started stroking her back, hoping to lull her into a restful sleep. “Derrick?”
     
    “Yeah, babe.”
     
    “I’m not going to want to leave you.”
     
    Those words.
     
    They crushed my heart into powder so it would blow away with the wind.
     
    I couldn’t think of Ariana leaving and what I would do when she was gone. It was inevitable, something that could not be avoided. She didn’t belong in this war zone, and I didn’t belong in the normal world. We both had commitments that we were too stubborn to ignore.
     
    For just a moment I entertained the thought of what it would be like to have a regular relationship with her back home. I pictured the house with a picket fence, the mornings we’d wake up to the smell of fresh coffee brewing, watching a movie before retiring to bed for the night.
     
    It was all there in my imagination, the whole scene. But it wasn’t realistic. I’d tried to live in the normal world, and my drug habit had almost killed me. It was the Army that had gotten me back on the straight and narrow. The military was where I belonged.
     
    But I couldn’t share any of that with Ariana. She didn’t know of my past, and I wasn’t about to share it with her. She wouldn’t look at me the same way if she knew how many people I’d hurt with my habit. I still couldn’t look my mother in the eyes after what I’d put her through.
     
    I steeled myself for the words I had to say. I took a deep breath, ready to tell her she wouldn’t even give me a thought when she saw the plane that would take her out of here. That I would be a forgotten memory by the time she arrived home.
     
    My words caught in my throat, remaining unspoken.
     
    The truth was I couldn’t think about her leaving. Otherwise, I might have made sure she never reached that plane.
     
     
     
     

Chapter 11
Ariana
     
     
         ҉     ҉     ҉     ҉     ҉     ҉
     
     
     
    I woke up in the passenger seat. If I wasn’t still naked I might have thought the night with Derrick was just an erotic dream.
     
    My pussy was pleasantly sore, another reminder that I hadn’t dreamed the events. Derrick had promised to fuck me and I had let him. No, not just let him. I’d wanted it too. I’d wanted to feel the closeness and intimacy, to know that I wasn’t alone so far out in the desert. It was easy to think the entire world had disappeared when we were stuck in the middle of nowhere.
     
    Derrick was awake already. Dressed, too. He was used to waking with the sun, but I wasn’t. Sleeping in and late breakfasts were my preference. None of this early bird crap.
     
    I caught him openly ogling my naked body. He didn’t even have the decency to look away. “I hope you’re enjoying the free show,” I mumbled.
     
    “Ain’t nothing free about it, babe,” he replied. It was too early to try to figure out what he meant by that. I let the comment pass over me.
     
    “Can you at least pass me my clothes,