“The usual dumb excuses. A party without our spouses. Too much drinking and reminiscing. Me feeling ignored by my wife whose focus was on our new daughter. Your mom vulnerable from the difficulties she and your father had been having in conceiving a child—something they both wanted very much.”
Jesus. Scott didn’t know what to say. “I didn’t realize.”
“Of course you didn’t,” the senator said sternly. “You weren’t supposed to. You were a child.”
“When did my father learn the truth?”
“As soon as your mom realized she was pregnant she went right to him—before she told me, as a matter of fact. By that time I’d gotten my head out of my ass and realized how much I loved my wife and what an arrogant, selfish fool I’d been.”
“Did your wife know?” Kate had seemed to think she hadn’t.
He shook his head. The stern facade softened in shame. “I never told her. Maybe I should have, but I was too scared she would never forgive me or be able to look at me the same way again. And there was Katherine to consider. But your dad forgave your mom for her moment of stupidity. He did more than forgive. He considered it a gift.”
Scott was incredulous. “What? For cheating on him?”
“No, maybe not for that. But for you. He’d just found out that he couldn’t have a child. Not knowing how to tell your mom was one of the reasons they’d been fighting.”
Scott couldn’t believe it. “So he knew? This whole time he knew?”
The senator nodded. “But he never wanted you to. He made your mom and me promise never to tell you. It was a promise I came to regret. At the time, I’m ashamed to admit that I was worried about my wife and the election I was about to run. I didn’t think about all that I would be giving up.”
“But you kept your word?”
“Reluctantly. I felt I owed it to him. And I would have gone on keeping it if Kate hadn’t come to me with what you both had found out. I’d kept up with you. Followed your progress. I wasn’t surprised that you’d gone into the service. It’s in your blood. I was the first in the family not to go into the military. My father was an air force pilot in Korea, and my grandfather was an admiral in the Pacific during the Second World War.”
Shit. Scott didn’t know what to say. Kate had never said anything. Although he supposed he’d never asked. He’d made it clear the subject was off-limits.
But it was what else he’d learned that was harder to process. He was both overcome and humbled by what he’d just heard. His father had known and loved him anyway. He hadn’t been deceived.
The senator stood, obviously intending to leave him with his thoughts. “You were Stephen Taylor’s son from day one. I’m not trying to change that. But I’d like to get to know the man he raised in the little time I have left.”
Scott watched him go, feeling as if the world—his world—had just shifted all over again.
Twenty
Natalie felt the shadow fall over her and opened her eyes. She blinked. Scott loomed over her, his body—his big, half-naked body—blocking most of the sunlight.
For all that he was a SEAL and spent a good part of his life in the water, she’d actually never seen him in a bathing suit before—in this case, board shorts that hung nice and low on his hips, emphasizing the washboard stomach and eight-pack abs. The print was green camo with some kind of flag on the tag. Jamaica maybe?
“You carry board shorts with you on all your missions?” she asked with a laziness she wasn’t really feeling anymore. Her pulse was racing a little too fast for that.
He smiled and scooted her feet over to sit down on the end of her lounge chair. “Never know when surf will be up. Gotta be prepared.” He lifted a brow, taking in her white shorts and T-shirt. “I was hoping you’d tossed in a nice teeny-weeny bikini.”
“Sorry. Even if I could squeeze into one right now, a bathing suit didn’t make your two-minute packing cut.”
He frowned, letting his gaze roam over her again. There was something hot and possessive about it that made her think he wouldn’t mind a little squeezing into in certain places. Namely the chest area where he couldn’t seem to take his eyes off her tight scoop-neck T-shirt.
“You look incredible. You are barely showing.”
Her hand went self-consciously to the slight round bump on her stomach. The one problem with the T-shirt was that it fit snugly against her stomach, too.
His gaze followed and Natalie felt her cheeks flush. When he lifted his eyes to hers, the look that passed between them made her chest squeeze with the kind of happiness she never thought would be hers.
They were going to have a baby together and sharing that with him filled her with a new kind of joy. A special kind. Her secret wasn’t just hers anymore. Knowing Scott would be there for the baby was such a relief; for the first time she actually felt truly happy about her pregnancy.
“The senator guessed,” Scott said.
“He did?”
“He noticed you weren’t drinking wine last night and only decaf this morning.”
She crossed her arms and glared at him a little. “And not any barely there bumps?”
Scott grinned. “He might have mentioned something.”
She socked him playfully, doing more damage to her knuckles than the rock-hard muscle of his arm.
But then all of the sudden, she realized what he was saying. “You talked to him?”
He nodded. “You were right.”
“I was?”
He stood and dragged her to her feet. “I’ll tell you all about it if you swim with me.”
“But I don’t have a . . .”
She didn’t get to finish. He picked her up and tossed her into the water fully clothed. When she came up sputtering—and cursing—he had already dived in and swum half the length of the pool underwater.
She didn’t bother trying to catch him. She knew when she was out of her league. Instead she swam over to the entry stairs and sat in the water, which actually felt refreshing, waiting for him to come up for air.
He had to come up sometime, right?
As her watch was now a doorstop, she’d guess it was a good two minutes—and four lengths of the twenty-five-meter pool—before he did.
He stopped and stood a good ten feet away from her at the bottom edge of the stairs, breathing heavily. The water was only about three feet deep there, which gave her plenty of wet chest and abs to view. But it was a big, Cheshire cat grin that was getting to her right now. He was obviously proud of himself.
“You’re buying me a new watch,” she said, holding up her wrist. It hadn’t been expensive, but the one he’d be buying her would be. “And I’ve suddenly taken a fancy to little gold crowns on my watches.”
He laughed at the reference to a Rolex. “Whatever it costs me it was worth it. The expression on your face was priceless.”
“What if I hadn’t known how to swim?”
“You would have learned fast or realized you could stand—it’s only five feet there. And we’d be having mandatory lessons before anyone found out. Christ, that would be embarrassing.”
He might have shivered.
“Lucky for you then that I was pollywog champ in the seven-to-eight-year division at my local swim club.” Indoor swim club—it was Minnesota after all—but she left that out.
“Pollywog?”
“It’s a tadpole.”
“I know what it is. I was just impressed.”
She harrumphed. “You should be.”
He inched closer, eyeing her carefully. “You still mad?”
She gave him a long look, trying not to be distracted by how sexy he looked and failing miserably. “I don’t get mad, I get even.” She gave him a smile of pure evil. “When you least expect it . . . expect it.”
“Now you’re just turning me on,” he said in a husky v
oice continuing his walk-wade toward her.
She shook her head and laughed. “You’re weird.”
“And you’re hot. Especially in that white T-shirt.”
She looked down and seeing everything—everything—screeched and jumped out of the pool. She ran over to the lounge chair to get her towel to wrap it around her.
He was laughing as he came up next to her and grabbed another towel to dry off.
“You’re horrible,” she said. “How could you just let me sit there practically naked? What if someone had come up?”
“They would have been jealous as hell,” he said matter-of-factly. “Then I would have had to kill them for looking.”
She rolled her eyes. “Don’t be such a Neanderthal.”
He pulled her into his arms. “My eyes only, sweetheart.” He leaned down. “And unless you want to put that pool house to use, we should probably head back to the room.”
She didn’t need to ask why. She could feel exactly what he had in mind pounding hard against her stomach.
Maybe the wet T-shirt thing wasn’t bad after all.
* * *
• • •
It was a long time before Natalie came up for air. Scott barely got the bedroom door shut before he was sliding those big, strong hands of his under her wet T-shirt and lifting it off.
Her shorts came next.
Then he just stood there and looked at her standing in her see-through lace bra and underwear for a while. She might have been self-conscious, but she could see from the board shorts that he liked what he saw. Liked it a lot.
He reached out with the back of his finger to caress a nipple that was hard not just from the cold.
“You are so fucking hot,” he said in a soft, husky voice. “I’m going to send a thank-you note to whatever company made that underwear.”
She flushed, more with pleasure than with embarrassment. She might dress modestly most of the time, but she did like her sexy underwear.
The bra had gotten a little tight, but if the look on Scott’s face was any indication—or the fact that his gaze was pretty much pinned to her chest—he didn’t seem to mind the spillover factor.
“It’s just Target,” she said. “But I’m glad you approve.”
“Approve.” He added a second hand to his admiration, rubbing both tips with his thumbs while cupping her breasts with his hands. “I’m in fucking teenage heaven. You look like you just stepped out of a magazine.”
She didn’t need to guess what kind of magazine he meant. His hungry expression said it all. “Hmm. I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“Definitely a compliment,” he said, his voice even huskier, as he bent over and took one of the tips he’d been playing with in his hands into his mouth—lace and all.
She moaned as the warmth enfolded her. As he sucked and nipped. As his hand dipped between her legs under the other tiny piece of lace.
She was already wet when his finger found her. The smooth, deft stroking nearly brought her to her knees.
Which gave her an idea.
She reached out and started to do a little playing of her own. Molding her hand around the hard column through the damp fabric of his shorts.
When she circled him and tugged, he lifted his head from her breast and started to push her back on the bed.
She stopped him. “Not so fast. I’m going to add to a few of those teenage fantasies of yours.”
He didn’t need to ask what she had in mind. She’d already dropped to her knees and was loosening the ties of his shorts, which wasn’t easy with the wet laces.
The side benefit was the delicious torture of making him wait and anticipate. It was easy to tell how much he was anticipating from the groans, the increasing pressure of the fingers running through her hair and holding her head, and by the size of the erection that finally bobbed free.
He was big and hard; he looked like a polished slab of red marble. She used her thumb to spread the tiny drop at the tip around the plump head. “Naughty boy,” she said, bringing her mouth closer. She loved how tight his stomach muscles got as her mouth neared. “You are supposed to wait for me.”
She looked up. His expression was every bit as tight as his stomach muscles as he gazed down at her with something resembling torture on his face. The fingers in her hair clenched a little harder. She knew how badly he wanted to pull her mouth toward him.
But Lieutenant Commander Scott Taylor was too controlled—and too much of a gentleman—to exert any kind of force. It was one of the things she loved most about him. Sex for him was about giving. And she knew he would give every bit and then some more than he received.
It made her warm and tingly just thinking about what he’d do to her for teasing him like this.
But right now was all about him. She ended his torture and took that big, beautiful erection into her mouth.
It wasn’t easy.
Her lips stretched around the fat head, sucking a little the way he liked as she drew him deeper and deeper into her mouth. As her tongue circled and her teeth lightly raked. As she milked him with her lips and hand. Sucking, stroking, moving her mouth up and down with long deep pulls. Slow at first, and then faster as he started to lose control. As his ass clenched, as his body stiffened, as she heard him groan with pleasure and tell her how good it felt. How much she was turning him on. How he was going to come.
She loved it when he talked to her like that. When the polished, always-put-together officer got a little raunchy. But he didn’t need to say anything. She knew his body too well. She could feel the clenching, the stiffening, the pulsing of the long vein as the pressure became too much. As he thrust deep into her mouth and cried out his release.
That he was still standing when the last drop had ebbed was an impressive feat. But it wasn’t long before he had her back on the bed, her lacy underwear gone, her legs wrapped over his shoulders, and his head between her legs. He brought her to the slow, delicious heights of pleasure.
Twice.
But he still wasn’t done with her. As she discovered when he moved over her, lifted her legs around his hips, and started to push inside.
She lifted her gaze to his, her heart warming at the tender look on his face. “Pretty impressive for a thirty-three-year-old man past his prime, LC. That’s quite a twenty-minute turnaround.”
He just shook his head as if he felt sorry for her. “You should know better than to toss down a gauntlet like that to a SEAL.”
She quirked a single brow. “What, do all SEALs have fragile male egos?”
He answered with a hard push that made her gasp and left him fully seated inside her. He let her feel him like that for a moment—filling her completely—before responding. “No, we are all born competitors. And you, sweetheart, just gave me a challenge.” He smiled wickedly. “I’ll show you past my prime.”
And he did. Very thoroughly, and very exhaustingly.
By the end, when he finally let her come, she was the one begging for quarter.
* * *
• • •
Scott couldn’t remember the last time he took a nap in the afternoon. But after making Natalie regret her “past your prime” comment, he collapsed alongside her, feeling every one of those thirty-three years.
He fell asleep with her still half under him. But by time he woke, they’d switched positions and she had her head propped up on her chin, watching him.
“Twice in two days that I get to watch you sleep,” she said with a smile. “That must be some kind of record.”
He stretched a little, letting his hand slide over her bare bottom. Hey, he was a guy. He’d cop a feel whenever he could.
He patted her lightly on the ass and smiled. “I guess you just put me to sleep.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Now who is issuing challenges?”
He laughed and tuc
ked her under his arm. “Not me. I know better. You’ll kill me.” Realizing the duvet was still at the bottom of the bed where they’d kicked it, he asked, “You cold?”
She looked at him incredulously. “You’re kidding, right? Lying next to you is like being wrapped in an electric blanket. It’s practically a fire hazard!”
He laughed and grinned. “Lying next to you makes me hot.” His eyes scanned her body and all the teasing left his voice. “You’re so incredible. I don’t know how I got so lucky.”
Her expression grew serious and kind of sad. “I’d hardly call it lucky, Scott. Your connection with me hasn’t exactly made your life easy—and it’s only going to get worse. It would have been a lot better for you if I’d never bumped into you in that bar.”
He pushed back a little to look at her, but she was drawing circles on his chest with the kind of intensity that made him think she was avoiding his gaze.
He took her chin and forced her gaze to his. “How can you say that?”
“Easy. All I’ve brought is deception and destruction into your life.”
“Did you forget about this?” His hand found the soft curve of her stomach. “We’re having a baby, Nat. And I think that’s pretty incredible. Not to mention that if it weren’t for you I probably wouldn’t be here, and I also wouldn’t have found out the truth about my own father.”
She frowned. “What do you mean?”
He’d meant to fill her in on his conversation with the senator earlier, but he’d been distracted by that T-shirt. “I talked to the senator. He told me that my dad knew the whole time that I wasn’t his biologically. He knew and loved me anyway.”
She smiled so broadly it lit up her whole face; the warmth was contagious. “That’s wonderful, Scott. I’m so happy for you. I know how much it bothered you to think he’d been deceived. What happened?”
He filled her in on what the senator had told him.
“You are lucky to have not one but two fathers who loved you,” she said. “But I’m not surprised. You are eminently lovable.”
Out of Time Page 27
