The Complete Mackenzie Collection Read online

  “Zane…wait,” she whispered, lifting one hand to his head. It was the only movement she had enough energy to make. “I can’t—I need to rest.”

  He slid down between her legs and lifted her thighs onto his shoulders. “You don’t have to move,” he promised her in a deep, rich voice. “All you have to do is lie there.” Then he kissed her, slowly, deeply, and her body arched as it began all over again, and he showed her all the things he hadn’t been able to do to her before.

  He brought her to completion once more before finally crawling forward and settling his hips between her thighs. She moaned when he filled her with a smooth, powerful thrust. She quivered beneath him, shocked by the thickness and depth of his penetration. How could she have forgotten? The discomfort took her by surprise, and she clung to him as she tried to adjust, to accept. He soothed her, whispering hot, soft words in her ear, stroking her flesh, which was already so sensitive that even the smooth sheet beneath her felt abrasive.

  But, oh, how she had wanted this. This. Not just pleasure, but the sense of being joined together, the deep and intimate linkage of their bodies. This fed a craving within her that the climaxes he’d given her hadn’t begun to touch. Her hips lifted. She wanted all of him, wanted him so deep that he touched her womb, ripening with his seed. He tried to moderate the thrusts that were rapidly pushing her toward yet another climax, but she dug her nails into his back, insisting without words on everything he had to give.

  He shuddered, and with a deep-throated groan, gave her what she asked.

  She slept then. It was long after midnight on the east coast, and she was exhausted. She was disturbed by the presence of the big, muscled man beside her in the bed, though, his body radiating heat like a furnace, and she kept waking from a restless doze.

  He must sleep like a cat, she thought, because every time she woke and changed positions, he woke up, too. Finally he pulled her on top of him, settling her with her face tucked against his neck and her legs straddling his hips. “Maybe now you can rest,” he murmured, kissing her hair. “You slept this way in Benghazi.”

  She remembered that, remembered the long day of making love, how he had sometimes been on top when they dozed, and sometimes she had. Or perhaps she had been the only one who dozed while he had remained alert.

  “I’ve never slept with a man before,” she murmured in sleepy explanation, nestling against him. “Slept slept, that is.”

  “I know. I’m your first in both cases.”

  The room was dark; at some time he had turned off the lamp, though she didn’t remember when. The heavy curtains were drawn against the neon of the Las Vegas night, with only thin strips of light penetrating around the edges. It reminded her briefly of that horrible room in Benghazi, before Zane had taken her away, but then she shut out the memory. That no longer had the power to frighten her. Zane was her husband now, and the pleasant ache in her body told her that the marriage had been well and truly consummated.

  “Tell me about your family,” she said, and yawned against his neck.

  “Now?”

  “Mmm. We’re both awake, so you might as well.”

  There was a twitch of flesh against her inner thigh. “I can think of other things to do,” he muttered.

  “I’m not ruling anything out.” She wriggled her hips and was rewarded by a more insistent movement. “But you can talk, too. Tell me about the Mackenzie clan.”

  She could feel his slight shrug. “My dad is a half-breed American Indian, my mom is a schoolteacher. They live on a mountain just outside Ruth, Wyoming. Dad raises and trains horses. He’s the best I’ve ever seen, except for my sister. Maris is magic with horses.”

  “So the horses really are a family business.”

  “Yep. We were all raised on horseback, but Maris is the only one who went into the training aspect. Joe went to the Air Force Academy and became a jet jockey, Mike became a cattle rancher, Josh rode jets for the Navy, and Chance and I went to the Naval Academy and got our water wings. We can both fly various types of aircraft, but flying is just a means of getting us to where we’re needed, nothing else. Chance got out of Naval Intelligence a couple of years ago.”

  Barrie’s talent with names kicked in. She lifted her head, all sleepiness gone as she ran that list of names through her head. She settled on one, put the details together and gasped. “Your brother is General Joe Mackenzie on the Joint Chiefs of Staff?” Of course. How many Joe Mackenzies were Air Force generals?

  “The one and only.”

  “Why, I’ve met him and his wife. I think it was the year before last, at a charity function in Washington. Her name is Caroline.”

  “You’re right on target.” He shifted a little, and she felt a nudging between her legs. She inhaled as he slipped inside her. Talk about right on target.

  “Joe and Caroline have five sons, Michael and Shea have two boys, and Josh and Loren have three,” Zane murmured, gently thrusting. “Junior will be the eleventh grandchild.”

  Barrie sank against him, her attention splintered by the pleasure building with each movement of his hips. “Don’t talk,” she said, and heard his quiet laughter as he rolled over and placed her beneath him…just where she wanted to be.

  Chapter 12

  Barrie awoke to nausea, sharp and urgent. She bolted out of bed and into the bathroom, barely reaching it in time. When the bout of vomiting was over, she sank weakly to the floor and closed her eyes, unable to work up enough energy to care that she was curled naked on the floor of a hotel bathroom, or that her husband of less than twelve hours was witness to it all. She heard Zane running water; then a wonderfully cool, wet washcloth was placed on her heated forehead. He flushed the toilet, something she hadn’t been able to manage, and said, “I’ll be right back.”

  As usual, she rapidly began to feel better after she had thrown up. Embarrassed, she got up and washed out her mouth and was standing in front of the mirror surveying her tousled appearance with some astonishment when Zane appeared with a familiar green can in his hand.

  He had already popped the top. She snatched the can from him and began greedily drinking, tilting the can up like some college freshman guzzling beer. When it was empty, she sighed with repletion and slammed the can down on the countertop as if it was indeed an empty soldier of spirits. Then she looked at Zane, and her eyes widened.

  “I hope you didn’t go out to the drink machine like that,” she said faintly. He was still naked. Wonderfully, impressively naked. And very aroused.

  He looked amused. “I got it out of the minibar in the parlor.” He glanced down at himself, and the amusement deepened. “There’s another can. Want to go for it?”

  Barrie drew herself up and folded a bold hand around his thrusting sex. “I’m not the kind of woman who loses her inhibitions after a couple of Seven-Ups,” she informed him with careful dignity. She paused, then winked at him. “One will do.”

  Somehow she had expected they would make it back to the bed. They didn’t. His hunger was particularly strong in the mornings, and after a tempestuous few moments she found herself on her knees, half bent over the edge of the bathtub while he crouched behind her. Their lovemaking was raw and fast and powerful, and left her once again lying weakly on the floor. She found some satisfaction in the fact that he was sprawled beside her, his long legs stretched under the vanity top.

  After a long time he said lazily, “I’d thought I could wait until we were in the shower. I underestimated the effect of a soft drink on you, sweetheart…and what watching you drink it does to me.”

  “I think we’re on to something,” she reflected, curling nakedly against him and ignoring the chill of the floor. “We need to buy stock in the company.”

  “Good idea.” He turned his head and began kissing her, and for a moment she wondered if the bathroom floor was going to get another workout. But he released her and rose lithely to his feet, then helped her up. “Do you want to have room service, or go down to a restaurant for breakfast?”