Beach Reads Box Set

by Madden-Mills, Ilsa

  “Because I can. Because it’s a chance to correct the course, and I’m taking it. I’m not trying to raise people from the dead, Tesoro. Just trying to fix things going forward.”

  “What if I make the same mistakes they did?” she asks.

  “I hate to break it to you, Tesoro. But, you have your own flaws to worry about. You’re stubborn, impulsive, and for all your instincts about violence, you seem to walk into danger all the time. Like falling off cliffs that you go walking down at night.” I tap the tip of her nose with my finger.

  “Don’t touch my nose; it’ll make me sneeze. And thanks for the praise.” She shoves my shoulder lightly.

  “Tell me mine,” I ask.

  “Your flaws?”

  “I know … you probably have to think really hard about it,” I joke.

  “You’re possessive, cynical, and suspicious,” she says without missing a beat. I let out a bark of surprised laughter, and then I kiss her softly.

  “And you’re perfect. And mine,” she adds.

  A cloud breaks over us. Sun streams in, and it feels like the return from a long march, and I’m so glad to be home.

  When I break the kiss, she cups my face and sighs my name.

  “Yeah, that’s better. Next time you say my name, though, I want you to scream it,” I say, then stand up and throw her onto the bed.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Thunder

  Confidence

  I land on Hayes’s mattress with a small bounce and little shriek. My heart is thudding as I push my hair out of my eyes and see him looking at me like I’m the very last meal he’ll ever eat.

  His nostrils flared, his eyes hot with desire, and his lips are flushed. Mine tingle, sending signals to him that they want to feel him. All of him. I’ve missed him more than I can say. Sex was one of the ways we communicated.

  We would say “I love you,” “I hate you,” “I’m scared,” “I’m angry” when we fuck. And now, I’m hungry to know everything he’s kept from me in the time we haven’t touched each other.

  “Tesoro,” he says huskily and pulls his shirt off. I can’t believe all of that is mine. He pulls his jeans off, too, and the most beautiful cock in the world peeks out of the top of his boxers.

  “Come here.” I crook my finger and he lies down next to me. He slides one of his strong, warm hands up my thigh and cups my pussy.

  “Fuck, you can never ever keep this from me again,” he says and pinches my clit. I gasp loudly, sharply, and I rock into his hand as heat and wetness fill my panties and I press against the warmth of his palm.

  He dips his head and takes my lips with his and I sob at how perfectly right it feels to have my lips in the sacred embrace of his.

  “I love you so much,” he whispers into my mouth. “I never want to be away from you, Tesoro. Never.” He grabs the front of my blouse and yanks until the straps give … the fabric sliding down my body sends a rush of anticipation across my skin like a river of electric shocks.

  “I love you, too,” I say urgently, desperate to get these words out of the way so that I fall into his kiss and drown in the river of emotion he’s swept me away on. He gives me what we both need. He cups the back of my neck and rolls us until he’s lying on top of me, and then he slams his mouth onto mine and pushes past my lips and sweeps my mouth with his tongue. He kisses me like that and I can’t breathe. I don’t want to. I want to die with him stealing the breath from my lungs. I want to drown in him.

  When he drags his lips off my mouth, he takes my lower lip with him and holds onto it with his teeth. The sting of his bite feels so good. Just like everything he gives me. Even when it hurts.

  He drops his forehead onto mine. Our chests heave in unison, we breathe nose to nose, open mouth to open mouth. His eyes are shining and they hold me in a trap so exquisitely loving that I feel like I’m floating.

  “I would cross galaxies for you, swim every ocean, fight dragons,” he says and his hands push my skirt up around my waist. He pushes my panties aside, wets his fingers by pressing them into my mouth and then slips his hand between us. He skims my clit with the edge of his blunt finger nail and then slides three of his big fingers into me.

  I cry out at the sharp bite of my flesh stretching. He pushes them in, pulls them back out, and bends his head to my breast.

  “I love seeing you like this. Your pussy is so goddamn tight, Tesoro.” He captures my nipple through the lace of my bra. He bites it and flicks the sensitive flat of it with the firm tip of his tongue.

  I’m chanting his name and he finger fucks me harder, bites my swollen nipple and tears leak from the corner of my eyes as my orgasm breaks with no warning.

  “Ti amo tanto,” he says against my chest and I feel the reverberation of his words in my heart.

  “I love you, too,” I respond.

  He kisses his way upward. His mouth is wet, his breath hot as his breathing grows more ragged.

  “Sei la mia anima gemella,” he says as he parts my thighs.

  “And you are mine,” I respond.

  “Non posso vivere senza te,” he says and slides into me with one, deep, powerful thrust forward of his hips.

  “You’ll never have to live without me,” I assure him

  He grips the headboard.

  “Ti fotterò così forte,” he growls.

  “I don’t know what that means,” I moan when he pulls back out.

  “It means I’m going to fuck you so hard ...” He bites his lip and tightens his grip on the headboard. I’m mesmerized by the flex and bulge of his big biceps over my head.

  “So hard that what?”

  “Let me show you,” he says and he thrusts up into me so hard my whole body slides up the mattress and the headboard rattles.

  “Let me ride that wave, Tesoro,” he pulls back out of me and I smile wide, lick my dry lips and gaze up at my god of sin, my Duke of Midnight, my renaissance man, my heartbreaker, my heart fixer, my everything.

  I’ll never stop falling in love with him. We make magic together.

  I want to hold my breath and stop time. The feeling I have, of being enough, of being loved for all that I am, with no desire to change anything about me. With more than acceptance of the baggage I bring—with pride. I want him and this forever. Right now though, even that wouldn’t be long enough for me.

  “You make me so fucking crazy.” He puts one hand on my hip and starts short, deep, hard, fast and my eyes roll to the top of my head at the intensity of his fucking. I feel like I’m being consumed.

  “Sei il tesoro più prezioso che ho trovato e che vorrei custodire per sempre”

  I have no idea what that means, but I remember the first time he called me Tesoro, and my heart swells. I flash back to the moment I fell in love with him. It was that night on the ledge when I was sure that I was going to die.

  And my heart, facing its potential demise, made a decision. If he hadn’t been there, I wouldn’t have made it off that cliff. And since that night, he’s owned my heart. That river will roll over the delta whenever nature commands her to without any regard for the best laid plans of mice and men. And Hayes, my river, will roll over me. And I will love him through it all because my heart has chosen him.

  “I would rearrange the universe to have you,” he says, and his body flexes over me. The muscles in his shoulders and arms flex under the smooth golden-hued skin that covers his beautiful body, and his thrust is so deep and hard that I’m sure he’ll split me in half.

  His chest heaves and he thrusts up again.

  “Rearrange me,” I sigh and he thrusts even harder.

  “Shatter me,” I beg and he fucks me hard, his arms and chest flex and ripple over my head, and when I come in the most spectacular explosion of tension I’ve ever felt, my whole world distills to the moment that would make this act between us a covenant—a promise.

  He grunts into my neck and drills me into the mattress.

  Yes, I will never get enough of this.

 
He lifts onto his knees and grips the headboard, his lower lips trapped between his teeth, his body moving like a machine between my thighs—fast, hard and unrelenting—until he throws his head and shouts my name between grunts.

  He pulls out and spurts on my stomach and thighs. “I claim you,” he pants, before he slides back into me.

  Our come mingles and smears between our sweaty bodies. I lift my hips and press us together. My orgasm’s aftershocks are still sending dancing, shimmering shivers of electricity through me.

  Then Hayes drops his big body onto the bed next to me, and a huge cracking sound is our only warning before the entire bed collapses beneath us.

  We lay on the sunken mattress and stare at each other before we burst out into laughter.

  Then, as if in response to our mirth, the splatter of rain starts to beat on the window.

  “It was raining during our first time in Italy,” I remind him.

  “‘Because thunder only happens when it’s raining,’” he croons the hook to the Fleetwood Mac classic in my ear. “And I promise you, this is the only place where we’ll make this kind of noise. In our home, there will always be peace, You’ll always be safe,” he whispers and pulls me into his arms.

  And then he rolls me over, slides back into me, and we make a storm of our own.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Surprise

  Confidence

  Two Weeks Later

  “Hey, I’m heading to Sweet and Lo’s after my appointment at Blush. Want to meet me for coffee?” I whisper in Hayes’s ear. His eyes are closed, but he’s been awake for at least five minutes. I heard the change in his breathing when I stepped out of my bathroom. I let him pretend, though, so he could watch me. I got dressed right in front of him. His broad, sun-darkened, muscular shoulders twitched when I slipped my panties on, but otherwise, he hasn’t moved.

  I inhale the scent of his sleep and sweat and our sex, and I want to get back into bed with him. But I have an appointment at Blush where it’s very hard to get an appointment. It’s one of Houston’s premier hair salons. The hair stylist, Tanaka, is one of the most sought-after stylists and colorists in the country, and she had a cancellation four weeks ago that bumped me up on the waitlist. And no way am I missing it, not even for a morning ride on Hayes’s gloriously thick dick.

  “Yeah, I’ll meet you.” His sleep-roughened voice is sexy, and the way his mouth moves as he forms his words is something I could sit and watch all day.

  “What time?” he asks sleepily into his pillow.

  I glance at my watch and do some quick math. “Maybe around eleven a.m.?” I say.

  One of his eyes pops open and he peers at the alarm clock by my bed and flips over, wide-eyed to stare at me.

  “Are you having a quadruple bypass? Why does it take four hours to get your hair done?” he asks. I smack his shoulders, and then my hand goes back for a more tender caress of the skin that’s wrapped around the love of my life.

  “I don’t have time to explain. Go back to sleep. You put in some good work last night. You must be tired.” I stand to leave.

  His long, sculpted arm darts out, and he wraps his fingers around my wrist. I lean in for a kiss and think if I skip my stop for coffee, I’ll have time for a quick little something—not that there’s ever been anything quick and little about sex with Hayes.

  The thought of coffee turns my stomach so violently that I pull back right before our lips touch and sit back down.

  “You okay?” he asks. His eyes are only half open, and those beautiful wild hazel eyes, are full of real concern.

  “Yeah, I’m fine. I don’t know what the hell, I just felt a little sick when I thought about coffee, which is crazy cause I can’t imagine how I’d get through the day without it.”

  “Get back into bed, and I’ll give you the other thing you can’t get through the day without.” He tugs me back to him.

  “No. If I don’t get this appointment, I’ll be in a bad mood until I get my hair done by her, and that’s at least a month away, if I’m lucky,” I tell him grouchily, but only because his offer is so tempting.

  “I think your hair looks amazing,” he says.

  “Because you’re a man and you’re fucking me. You probably don’t remember what color the hair on my head is unless I’m standing in front of you,” I joke and stand up again.

  “I’m insulted. You have no idea how much time I spend thinking about your hair. Wrapped around my fists when you’re on your knees in front of me. Draped around my hips when your lips are wrapped around my cock. Falling down around me when you’re riding me …”

  “Not when it’s blowing in the wind while we stroll?” I ask and shake my head in feigned disappointment

  “What fun would that be?” he asks. His grin is so wide and happy. I snap a picture of him with my phone and stare at it a beat before I look back at him. His eyes are sparkling, his morning stubble is dark and heavy, and his smile is full of contentment that I put there.

  “No fun at all,” I agree before I turn to leave.

  “Come back to bed,” he calls after.

  “Now way. I can’t be late for this. I’ll see you soon. Bye.” I chuck a peace sign at him and then walk happily out the door.

  * * *

  “Well, well, well,” the dark-haired, olive skinned, handsome man behind the reception desk at Blush drawls in the most beautiful baritone I’ve ever heard.

  I stop and look over my shoulder to find who he could be talking to. Because it can’t be me. There’s nothing interesting enough about me to warrant that intrigued look on his face. There’s no one there. I turn back to face him and plaster a confused smile on my face. “Are you talking to me?” I ask.

  His jaw drops. His eyes bug out of his head, he slaps his cheeks and then he shrieks.

  Loudly.

  I spin on my heel to get the hell out of there.

  “Wait, wait, wait,” he calls in that baritone again and in a display of super human speed, he’s behind me with a hand on my shoulder, stopping me.

  “Where are you going?” he asks with an amused chuckle.

  “Why’d you scream?” I ask him angrily and fold my arms across my chest while I wait for him to respond.

  “Because you look like Jayne Mansfield, who is like, my favorite actress of all time, and then you open your mouth and sound like Dolly Parton, who is my favorite singer of all time,” he explains.

  “I love and respect Dolly like any good Southerner, but I do not sound like her and I don’t know who Jayne is.”

  He actually steps back, grips his chin thoughtfully and studies my chest, “Hmmm, I’m telling you. If we brightened up that blonde all over and gave you one more bra cup, you’d be a dead ringer,” he says.

  “This is probably the strangest conversation I’ve ever had in my life,” I say.

  “It’s not strange.” He pouts. “They’re my idols. It’s like Dolly Parton and Jayne Mansfield had a baby and sent her to deliver me from an ordinary existence.” He claps his hands together repeatedly in my face.

  I smile and step around him.

  “Oh, I see. You’re crazy.” I point at him with a knowing smile.

  “Totally, sister, and I ain’t afraid to show it.” He winks and then we both laugh.

  “I’m Noé.” He sticks out his hand to introduce himself.

  I shake his big, warm, very soft hand. “What hand lotion do you use and where can I get some?”

  “Oh, it’s my own special blend,” he says with a wink, and I pull my hand out of his.

  “Are you making a sexual innuendo that implies that your special blend is your spunk? ‘Cause, if so, that is so nasty,” I say.

  “Nasty? Oh, sweet baby Jesus. You said nasty and you sound just like Dolly! Please tell me you’re a customer and you’re going to come in at least once a week.” He throws his head back dramatically.

  “I might come back once a week if this is the reception I get. I feel special,” I say with a cheeky
smile.

  “You are special. And hot to trot, too. But, we can’t stand here gabbing all day. Tanaka is a stickler for time, even for too-hot-to-trot blonde bombshells with great tits.” He gives me an exaggerated wink and grin, grabs me by the elbow, and leads me to the receptionist desk.

  I’m totally charmed by him. People who can talk to anyone amaze me.

  “What time is your appointment?” he asks as he leads me back to the reception desk.

  “It’s at seven-thirty. Color, cut, and blow out,” I say, excitedly.

  “Okay. I’m going to need you to fill out all the paperwork again,” he says and hands me a clipboard.

  I look down at the stack of papers and recognize the first one. “I filled these out online when I made my appointment. Why did you have me do it if I was going to have to do it again?” I say and look at him quizzically. This is one of my biggest pet peeves, so my good humor fizzles.

  He frowns sympathetically, either ignoring or missing my irritation. “I’m sorry. But your submission was all messed up. Your name was off, so we thought there might be other errors. I made the executive decision to delete it and have you do it again.” He pats my hand in more misguided sympathy. “Since we’re worried about the time, just fill out that top form, okay? You can do the rest while you’re under the dryer with your foils.” He winks.

  I purse my lips but fill out the form quickly. “Filling out redundant forms will not get between me and the magician who’s going to be like the miller’s daughter in Rumpelstiltskin and turn this hay into gold,” I say and then cringe at the high-pitched fangirl tone in my voice. “Sorry,” I mutter to Noé without looking up at him.

  “No problem, Dolly. She’s a legend and we get people in here acting like they’re about to be baptized. You’re tame. For now. Wait till you get done with your hair, you’ll be like one of those television pastors. It’s why our advertising budget is zero,” he says proudly.