Leave Me Breathless

by Cherrie Lynn

  Jared wasn’t supposed to be a part of her getting her old life back. She searched his face, looking for any signs of insincerity. Or veiled lechery. Nothing was there except his earnest, pleading blue eyes.

  “Jared…”

  “Come on. Just one day. If you don’t have fun, I promise I will never, ever bug you about hanging out with us again.”

  She crossed her arms, glared at him some more, chewed her bottom lip. Finally she released her breath in a huff, dropping the defensive stance and trying for her car door again. This time, he let her. “Fine! All right. I’ll freaking come over.” After opening the door, she put her finger in his face. “Listen to me. You try one thing, you say one thing that even remotely offends me or pisses me off, and I’m out of there. You got that? I’m serious, Jared.”

  He’d been grinning like the Cheshire cat, but he dropped all expression at her tirade. “I got it. I do. Yes, ma’am.” He saluted her.

  She rolled her eyes and escaped into the interior of her car, yanking her keys from her purse and jamming one in the ignition.

  “Saturday. Noon,” he said.

  “I know.”

  “Good night, Macy.” With a final grin that had a little too much triumph behind it for her liking, he shut her door.

  Seth’s sleepy voice as he answered his phone was the best damn thing she’d heard all day. Chuckling, she pulled her own covers up to her chin. “You were asleep.”

  “Yeah,” he yawned.

  “But you answered on, like, the first ring.”

  “Been waiting on you.”

  “Really?”

  “You didn’t answer my text earlier, though, so I didn’t know if you’d call or not.”

  “Sorry. I was at my parents’ having dinner.” Her brow furrowed. Should she tell him her ex-boyfriend was there? Or that they were hanging out this weekend? Was he the type to get mad about something like that? If he was, it probably wouldn’t be worth the drama. Wasn’t like he had anything to worry about.

  His laugh was slow and warm and…oh, what she wouldn’t give to hear it beside her instead of across a state line. She rubbed her thighs together restlessly.

  “That’s awesome,” he said.

  “Why?”

  “Call me deranged, but if I’d known you were at your parents’, I probably would’ve kept it up.”

  Thank God he hadn’t known, then. She would’ve been glued to her phone all night, and her mom might have flipped out. “You must feel a little better.”

  “Well…I’m all right.”

  “Everything…the same?”

  “Pretty much, yeah.”

  She wanted to ask how things were going with his brother, but that would probably be the last thing he wanted to talk about. “Where are you?”

  “Stephanie’s guest bedroom.”

  “Hmm. I guess you have to be quiet then.”

  “I’ve got no problem with that.” His voice dropped to an intimate timbre that made chills run from the tips of her toes to the roots of her hair. “I already miss you, Macy.”

  She’d missed him before she’d gotten in Sam’s car and rode away. Her hand, which had been resting on her belly, inched downward of its own volition. To think just a couple nights ago…

  “Can I take your mind off things?” she asked softly.

  “That would be fucking splendid.”

  “I was thinking about something earlier, just before I called you.” Her heart rate accelerated. She hadn’t exactly intended on letting him know just yet where her thoughts had been wandering, but if he wanted to occupy his mind with other things, she was certain she had the solution.

  “Uh-oh.”

  “We’re actually only three hours apart if we meet in the middle.”

  “Are you being serious?” All humor had left his voice.

  She pulled her lip between her teeth and considered for a moment. “If you’re up to it, absolutely. Not like this minute, because I need more sleep, but I just want to see you. I want to be there for you when I can. If you need to get away and you can’t come all the way home…I’ll come to you, I’ll come all the way if you need me to, but… say the word and I’m there.”

  “I’m… I don’t know what to say, really.”

  In the darkness of her room, she cringed. “Too much? I’m sorry.”

  “No—”

  “You’re dealing with something I have no experience with and I don’t know what to do to help. So tell me if I need to back off.”

  “You’re helping me by talking to me. By being there. By doing every damn thing you’re already doing.” He was quiet for a minute. She was tempted to fill the silence herself, but she let him have it. “This is more bearable because of you.”

  Her heart warmed, and she wanted so much to feel his lips on hers she might have driven those six hours right then, sleep be damned. That she wanted to be his any and every way she possibly could, both physically and emotionally, was a revelation that knocked the breath from her.

  Cautious Macy had fallen for the very kind of guy that should send her running for the hills.

  That had once, but she had her bearings now. She had a little of her old self back. Tiny, but it was there, and it was all thanks to him. She owed him far more than he could ever owe her.

  “Are you off Saturday?” he asked.

  Saturday. She was supposed to go to Jared’s Saturday. But if it came down to one or the other…there was no question.

  “Yeah. I’m usually off on weekends.”

  “Hmm.”

  “What are you thinking?”

  “I’m thinking by then I will damn sure need to get away for a few hours. I’m thinking overnight.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “I’m not sure I should, but…” He gave a frustrated growl. “Shit.”

  “Whatever you think,” she said quickly. “I don’t want to pull you away if you need to be there.”

  “I know that, baby. But I wouldn’t be considering it if I didn’t need to see you, too.”

  “You have to take care of you. I don’t care if we just talk all night.”

  “Oh, I think we can find more to do than that.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  It had been the longest week of his life. Whether it was the anticipation of seeing Macy or the absolute devastation of basically being on a death watch, he didn’t know. The two factors simply amalgamated into one long, never-ending stretch of agony.

  He felt better the instant he got away from the sterile hospital smells and on the road, putting miles between him and that damned place and eating up the ones that separated him from his girl. He ate them up a little too eagerly, resulting in a speeding ticket halfway to Fort Worth. It didn’t even matter. Minutes after getting back on I-35, he was flying again.

  She would probably get on his ass about that if she were here. He could almost hear her, and it seemed even her imagined nagging made him grin. He supposed he wouldn’t do either one of them any good if he got himself killed, so he managed to ease off the accelerator a little. The closer he got, the calmer he got.

  Macy had booked the hotel room and texted him the directions. She’d also said she would call him when she got there, so even though she’d left home earlier than he had, he figured as he pulled into the parking lot that he must have beaten her.

  Well, given the fucking ticket tossed over in his passenger seat, it was no wonder. At least the cop had let him go without searching his damn car. His appearance didn’t exactly present him as an upstanding citizen.

  After parking and stretching his legs for a minute, he grabbed his cell and dialed her. It was a perfect day, the sky a flawless, early spring blue. He stared at the cars zooming past on the interstate while he waited to hear her voice again.

  “Do not tell me you’re already there,” she answered.

  “Yeah, I am. Where is your slow ass?”

  “Hey, now. I’ll show you slow in about…twenty minutes, according to my GPS.”

&n
bsp; Oh, hell yes. “A’ight, then. Just making sure I wasn’t about to get stood up.”

  “Not in a million. See you soon.”

  “Be careful.”

  While he waited, he texted Steph, then called and shot the shit with Brian for a few minutes. The dude sounded frazzled but hid it fairly well. If Ghost hadn’t known him for half his life, he might have missed the strain.

  Did Brian think the same about him? Probably. Weren’t they just a couple of miserable clods. But brighter days lay ahead. They had to. He could put a bug in Macy’s ear that she needed to get her best friend to drag that guy away and fuck him senseless for a few days. He’d be a new man.

  A burgundy Acadia caught his attention as it whipped into a parking space a few down from him, and he said his good-byes to his friend.

  All through the week while he’d been away from Macy, he’d told himself she couldn’t be as beautiful as he remembered, he couldn’t feel for her this much this soon. He’d spent days having to look at Brooke, whose beauty was like a knife carving his heart out all over again. When Macy came around the back end of her SUV, her bright smile all for him, she was like a balm to his ragged senses. His breath fled him. He literally couldn’t take in air for a moment; he damn sure couldn’t speak.

  She couldn’t know she did this to him. Not ever. How could he give someone that kind of power over him, when every time he’d allowed it to happen before, everything had gone to shit?

  Macy flew into his arms, and he held her with all the conviction and determination he had in that moment to keep her at a distance. To not get so crazy so fast. It wasn’t smart, and he knew it; he just didn’t think good sense would be enough to trump his need for her. He was so fucked, careening madly down the path to getting his heart splattered all over hell. And grinning like a buffoon the entire time.

  Her scent engulfed him. Warm vanilla, even sweeter than he remembered, tempting him to eat her alive. She made a little helpless sound in his ear, and he damn near lost control of himself.

  “You okay?” he asked, wondering at her exuberance. They’d talked a lot in the past week, almost every night, but he realized they’d mostly talked about what was going on with him. What hurts and stresses had she come here to work out? He simply couldn’t believe she was only here to see him, but he had all night to get to the bottom of it.

  She nodded against his neck. “Mm-hmm. Long drive. Glad to be here, glad to see you.” She gave him another squeeze, and he set her feet on the ground, only then realizing he’d lifted her.

  “You look… You’re stunning, Macy.”

  A blush rose in her cheeks, and he couldn’t resist reaching up to caress them with his thumbs. Had no one other than him ever told her that before? It was most likely an idiotic assumption, but even so, it pissed him off. Any man she’d belonged to who neglected to praise her every damn day was a damn fool.

  “Thanks. I feel kind of wilted after being in the car all this time.”

  “Wilted, my ass. You’re in full bloom, baby.” He ducked as she laughed and swatted at him. “Hey, are you hungry? The city is our playground. I know we can find good sushi around here.”

  “Mmm. Yes, I’m hungry,” she said, running her finger underneath his chin and getting an instant reaction from down south. “But the food can wait awhile.”

  Damn straight it could. Somehow he made it through the next few minutes, waiting while she checked them in, unloading her bags for her, finding their room. It all passed in slow fucking motion. Lust had sucker-punched him. He hoped that woman knew what she’d signed on for, because he kept thinking he was going to go to hell for all the things he wanted to do to her.

  “I can’t help but feel naughty about doing this,” she said as she fitted the key card into the slot. “It feels like some illicit affair, sneaking off from life, meeting up at a hotel…”

  He grinned and hauled their overnight bags inside, dropping them by the door. “Then that’s what it is.”

  “Secret lovers. That aren’t exactly so secret anymore.” She glanced around the room. It was nice, cool, dim from the closed curtains. Hell, he didn’t give a fuck about the room. He only gave a fuck about the bed and the woman in the room.

  “Oh yeah? Who knows you’re here?” he asked.

  “You know…no one, actually. I didn’t even tell Candace or Sam where I was going.”

  “I hope there was no important reason for that, because Brian knows. So Candace probably does too.”

  Macy muttered something that sounded like, “That isn’t necessarily true,” as she leaned over and tested the softness of the bed, but he couldn’t be bothered to ponder over it. All he could focus on was the way her blousy brown shirt cinched at her little waist and those fucking ass-bling jeans molded to her butt.

  “Secret lovers, huh?” he said, moving toward her. She turned around and gave him a little smirk, taking a step back for every one he took forward. She wore her hair long and straight, and it spilled around her shoulders, inviting his fingers to sink into the heavy, lustrous silk of it. “That the way you want it?”

  “No. I didn’t mean that. Like I said, we aren’t so secret now.”

  And she didn’t mind. Jesus H. Could he love this girl the way she deserved? He could love her with everything he was, and still it wouldn’t be enough. He would fuck up somehow, because that was what he did.

  She’d stopped her teasing retreat from his advance and stood still now, big hazel eyes watching his approach until she was looking right up into his eyes. Unflinching. Open. Her breath came a little quickly; her pulse fluttered at the side of her neck.

  Would he ever get used to this breathless, speechless, fucking stupefaction she instigated when she was close to him? It all seemed so fragile… One wrong word, one wrong action from him and the whole thing would crack. He only knew how to really communicate with girls like Raina. Brash, in-your-face girls who knew why they were here: to fuck and fight and above all have a good time.

  Not girls like Macy, who looked at him with expectations beyond what he could give them physically. Girls like that should know to go elsewhere to get those needs met. Brooke sure as hell had. She’d even known right where to go.

  “Why’d you come here?” he asked, gently brushing back a lock of hair straying near her eye.

  Confusion flitted across her delicate features. “What?”

  “I’m sure it’s not about walking on the wild side anymore—hell, we never even really got there, did we? I’ve been a sucky tour guide.”

  “Seth, you’ve said and done things to me no one else has. I’ve done things and thought things and said things I never thought I would. So, no, you haven’t been a ‘sucky tour guide’. You’ve been…perfect. For me, you’ve been perfect.” She took his hand, the one that hadn’t quite been able to stop touching her hair, and let her fingers slide through his. “I even talked to my parents and one of my old friends about racing again. Baby steps,” she added quickly.

  Pride practically exploded in his chest. “Babe, that’s awesome.”

  “Well, thanks for confronting me about it.”

  “It’s all you. All I did was give you one little nudge.”

  “Yeah, but…it was a nudge no one else would give me. And you did way more than that.”

  “Oh? Like what?”

  “I know I can be sort of a closed book sometimes. You get me to open up. You aren’t afraid to do that. It means a lot, that you would make the effort. At that moment, it was like you knew me and what I needed to hear better than anyone else ever has.”

  Again, she was able to put something out there that strangled his heart in a chokehold and tied his friggin’ tongue up in knots. So he did the only thing he knew to do—pulled her in his arms and put his mouth on hers. If he couldn’t use it to speak to her right then, he could use it to make her feel good. To get closer to her.

  A sigh escaped her, and he drank it up, drank her in, sliding his hands down to her ass to pull her tight against his achin
g cock. She whimpered against his lips, and her tongue slipped between his teeth, teasing and tempting his until he plundered her back. Her body trembled and heated against his, and when she pulled away to look up at him, her eyes were a little brighter, her lips a little fuller.

  “Why didn’t you kiss me the first night we were together?”

  Seriously? “Couldn’t give you everything up front.”

  Her fingers curled around the back of his neck, warm and tantalizing. She wet her lips, and the knowledge that she tasted him there made his hands clench on her. “You gave me everything later.”

  He leaned in, sliding his lips across hers. “Not everything.” When she parted her lips to invite the invasion of his tongue once more, he eluded her, instead trailing his mouth down her jaw and her sweet-smelling neck.

  “Tease,” she chided, but he heard the tremor in the word. Chuckling, he reluctantly let go of her and stepped back, leaving her panting gently and staring at him in bewilderment.

  “Undress for me,” he told her.

  “What about you?”

  “In due time.” He sat on the bed and leaned back against the headboard. “Do it.”

  Expression unreadable, she regarded him for a few seconds, and he wondered if she might refuse despite the fact he’d seen her naked often enough.

  “You’re feeling like a bad girl today, remember,” he prompted her. “You’ve run away from life to meet up with your clandestine lover in a distant city, and no one knows where you are. You’re his for the night. It scares you a little, doesn’t it.” Her quick intake of breath caused her breasts to swell briefly, beguilingly. He couldn’t take his eyes off her, watching the effects of his words soften her body. “But it also gets you hot.”

  “Sometimes I think you know me a little too well.” Even as she said it, her hands slipped under the bottom of her shirt. Agonizingly slowly, she peeled it upward and over her head until her hair came free of it with a soft swish and settled back around her creamy, naked shoulders. His mouth ran dry at the sight of her lacy red bra, cut so low if she but moved, he might catch the slightest glimpse of the upper edge of her areola.