by Kaylea Cross
She’d been with him here for nine days now, and most of it had been a blur. He’d gone with her to all the interviews. Sat with her through her counseling sessions and her appointments with her psychiatrist, because she’d asked him to. Hearing her talk about her experience was hard.
Damn hard sometimes. But it also helped him as much as it did her. Helped him process what he was feeling, because he couldn’t compartmentalize this the way he could with most things he saw in the line of duty. Not when Poppy was the victim. She meant so fucking much to him. He couldn’t imagine his life without her in it, and was thankful every damn day that she was still here. When she’d had time to decompress, he wanted to talk about taking the next step together. Whatever she was ready for. Because he was ready for it all with her.
In addition to all of that he’d been slammed with work, focusing entirely on the investigation and leaving Crimson Point duties to his deputies. His parents called every day to check on him and Poppy. They wanted to come out and meet her, do something to help, but it wasn’t time yet. Poppy needed to heal still, and they needed more time alone together before Noah introduced her to his parents.
He only left Poppy alone when he had to, and only during the daytime. If he had to be somewhere when it got dark, he called Sierra to come be with her. His sister was run ragged too, juggling the clients at her veterinary practice in between helping him and Poppy and supporting Molly through her grief. That wasn’t going to work long-term, however. If Poppy needed that kind of continued support going forward, they would have to figure out something else.
Their circle of friends had been amazing but Carter’s funeral was in a week and everyone was busy splitting their time between work and helping Poppy and Molly. Molly had decided to bury Carter at a local cemetery rather than in his hometown in Kansas.
The house was silent as he got up and walked down the hall in his boxers. Poppy had shared his bed every night since coming here, but he’d always stayed at least partially dressed, not wanting her to feel pressured to do anything sexual while she wrestled with the aftermath of all she’d been through.
He’d been concerned about her staying here initially, worrying it was too close to her place and the site of the attack. It had to trigger all kinds of bad memories for her but she’d never said anything and he hadn’t asked, reluctant to bring it up. So far Poppy had been going from appointment to appointment in between doing all the admin stuff for Whale’s Tale from his place, and checking in with her staff. In his opinion she was coping damn well with everything.
He didn’t hear the TV at all as he headed for the kitchen. The kitchen was empty, only the light above the stove on.
He glanced around, noticed the French doors that led out to the back patio were open slightly. Stepping outside, he paused when he saw her.
She was standing at the fence with her back to him, wrapped in her robe as she stared into her backyard. A candle burned on the nearby table, spilling its golden warmth into the darkness.
Not wanting to frighten her, Noah spoke softly. “What are you doing out here?”
“Just thinking.”
Stopping behind her, he slid his arms around her waist and drew her back into him. Her hair smelled like raspberries. “About what?” he murmured.
“My house.”
Across the fence the little cottage was dark and still in the light from the sliver moon overhead.
“I miss it, but I’m not sure I’m ready to go back there yet.”
“Well it’ll be waiting for you when you are.” Except he didn’t want her to go back. He wanted to fall asleep beside her every night and wake up with her every morning. Was she ready for that? After everything she’d been through, he had to be patient, not overwhelm her. But it was damn hard to keep his feelings to himself.
She didn’t answer for a long moment, her fingers running gently along his bare forearms. Her stitches had come out yesterday. Her hands were still raw in places but healing more every day, just as she was. “It was supposed to be my little sanctuary. If I don’t go back, I’m letting him take something else from me.”
Just the mention of Paul made his muscles contract, anger and a fierce protectiveness punching through him. “You’ll go back when you’re ready.” And he’d miss her like hell when she did, even if she was only on the other side of the fence.
She sighed and rested her head back on his shoulder, looking up at the sky. “It’s so beautiful here. I love listening to the sound of the ocean.” Its hushed roar filled the night, a never-ending rush of waves against the shore.
“We should go back down to our picnic spot tomorrow night.”
“I’d like that.” She turned in his arms, settled her hands on his shoulders as she peered up at him. Then she reached her healing fingers up to stroke his bristled cheek. “Noah?”
He drank in the sight of her face, toyed with a lock of honey-blond hair that brushed her jaw. “Hmm?”
“I love you. So much.”
His heart imploded. The same words had been trapped in him for the past nine days, bursting to come out. He’d been waiting to say them, not wanting to rush her when she was so fragile. He’d never expected her to say them first.
With a groan he crushed her to him, burying his hand in her hair, his mouth pressed to her temple. “God, I love you too, sunflower.”
Her lips brushed a kiss over his chest, her arms coming tight around his waist. She raised her head to gaze up at him, the soft moonlight bathing her gorgeous face. “Take me upstairs and show me.”
He hid his surprise and scooped her up in his arms, pausing only to blow out the candle, Poppy’s delighted laugh filling him with joy even as need punched through him. He’d lain beside her night after night, aching to touch her, kiss her, make love to her, but afraid to push her when she was so fragile.
By the time he laid her down on his bed his entire body pulsed, the ache between his legs borderline painful. After switching on the bedside lamp, he stretched out on top of her but she took him off guard again by pushing at his chest until he rolled off.
Poppy quickly straddled his hips and reached down to undo her robe, shrugging it off in one quick move. Before he had time to enjoy the sight of her, she was bending over him, taking his face in her hands as her mouth met his in a scorching, passionate kiss. Noah moaned at the feel of his erection trapped against her center, the slick stroke of her tongue against his making his heart pound.
He buried one hand in her hair to keep her mouth on his, his other gliding over her satin-smooth skin. He touched her everywhere, mapped every luscious curve, the feel of her naked breasts pressed to his chest setting him on fire.
She lifted up enough to grab the waistband of his boxers. Noah arched his hips to help her, some distant part of his brain warning him to slow the hell down. This was only her second time, even if she hadn’t been through a traumatic experience.
With savage effort he locked his libido down, focused instead on arousing her. Caressing and kissing the spots he remembered had made her gasp and squirm the first time. The side of her neck. The underside of her breasts. Her belly. The silken inside of her thighs.
She sucked in a breath and released it on a plaintive moan when his mouth closed around one tight, pink nipple. He brought her closer with one hand planted in the center of her back, the other cradling the tender mound of flesh he was enjoying. When she was panting and moving restlessly he eased her off him and rolled her to her back to kiss his way down her stomach to the tender place between her thighs.
“Oh, Noah,” she moaned, her fingers locking in his hair, legs trembling as she spread them wider.
Perfect. He lost himself in her, in this moment of trust and intimacy, taking the time to build her pleasure as he licked and stroked and sucked at her softest skin.
When she was close, when her breaths came in excited pants and tiny mewls of pleasure came from her lips, he slid two fingers inside her to rub at her inner sweet spot. Her cry sent a jolt of lust
crashing through him. She tugged at his hair, whimpered his name.
He got a condom from the nightstand in record time, hissed when her hand closed around him to help roll it down his length. Her palms came up to press at his chest.
Heart thudding, dying to be inside her, he rolled to his back and seized her hips, bringing her up to straddle him. Her gorgeous brown eyes were hazy with need, her cheeks flushed as she stared down at him and began to sink down.
Noah gritted his teeth and somehow forced his eyes to remain open, unwilling to miss a single split second of the sight of Poppy taking him. Her lashes fluttered as her eyes fell closed, her long hair spilling down her spine as her head fell back. A low, throaty moan spilled from her as she took him to the hilt, one hand slipping down between her thighs to rub and tease at her swollen clit.
He shuddered, the breath halting in his throat. God, she was the sexiest, most breathtaking thing he’d ever seen.
Her head came up, her dazed brown eyes slowly focusing on him. And then she began to move. A slow, rocking motion that made sweat slick his spine, every hot, tight squeeze of her body around his cock pushing him closer to the edge.
She sank her teeth into her plump lower lip, a tiny frown forming between her brows. He grasped her hips and shifted his own to change the angle, desperate to make this good for her. To make her come before he did.
A minute later she closed her eyes, her frown increasing as she struggled to find the right angle and spot.
Making a snap decision, Noah gently disengaged them and rolled her onto her knees. Ignoring her sound of protest, he pressed an open-mouth kiss to the tender curve of her neck, one arm locking around her waist as he positioned himself against her entrance.
Poppy stilled and reached one arm back to band around his neck, giving him a mind-blowing eyeful of her full breasts as her back arched. He groaned into her neck as he eased inside her, one hand cupping the weight of her breast to tease the rigid nipple while his other delved down between her splayed thighs.
“Oh, don’t stop,” she breathed, her thigh muscles quivering.
“I won’t.” Not if it felt good for her. He urged her closer. “Lean back. I’ve got you,” he whispered, establishing a slow, gliding rhythm in and out of her, his hands busy intensifying her pleasure.
Her moans grew, drowning out the sound of their heavy breathing as she climbed toward the edge. Her hips began to move as she got close, rubbing him right where she needed him. She tightened around him, her breath hitching an instant before she called out his name and started coming.
Noah pressed his face into the curve of her neck and allowed the pleasure to expand inside him. It raced up his spine, pulling his balls taut, the feel of her pulsing around him and the sound of his name on her lips the most erotic experience of his life.
“Poppy,” he managed to gasp out an instant before he shot over the edge. He locked his arms around her, buried as deep as he could get inside her. Ecstasy punched through him, blotting out everything but the pleasure.
When he was finally able to open his eyes he groaned and kissed her shoulder, gently withdrew and eased her onto her back. Poppy immediately curled into him, murmuring in contentment as she stroked her fingers over his back. “Love you,” she whispered.
His throat tightened. “Love you.”
They lay there for a long time, basking in the shared closeness. Just as he was drifting off, her voice startled him awake. “Noah?”
“What?” he murmured, instantly on alert. Was she all right? He pulled his head back to see her better.
“I want to redo my garden. Erase any trace of his memory from it.” She was quiet a moment. “I want the vegetable patch in the front taken out and replaced with lawn and a small border of flowers and shrubs. And around the house, I want hydrangeas and Japanese maples. Anything he touched, I want gone. And no poppies,” she finished, shivering.
He trailed a finger down her cheek. “Okay.” Whatever she wanted.
“First thing tomorrow, will you help me start tearing it out?”
It took him a second for his brain to process that, and another to make sense of it. When it finally registered, he inhaled and hugged her tighter. “Damn right I will. I’ll have a backhoe here by noon.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Poppy stopped in the act of wrapping a towel around her wet body and turned her head, focusing on the window in Noah’s master bedroom en suite. The blind was down for privacy but she thought she’d heard something from next door at her place—
Voices. Lots of voices.
And one ringing out above all the others, deep and resonant. Even though she couldn’t make out what the man was saying, she could tell he was giving orders.
Dressing quickly, she drew her wet hair up in a hasty bun and brushed her teeth, her torn nail beds and the deep gouges on her hands stinging. Noah was just entering the bedroom when she walked into it. “There are people in my yard,” she told him.
“I know. I invited them.” He looked sexy as hell in a pair of faded jeans that clung in all the right places, and a light gray T-shirt that hugged his muscular torso. One side of his mouth lifted in a grin as he held out a hand to her. “Come and see.”
Curious, she slipped her hand into his larger one and followed him down the hall to the front door. Her hands barely hurt now, only tender in certain spots. Her nails were ruined beyond saving, torn way past the quick on most fingers, but no longer bleeding.
“What did you do?” she asked, trailing after him.
“You’ll see.”
True to his word, two days ago after the night he’d promised to call in a backhoe, one had arrived on a flatbed truck. Noah had been up at the crack of dawn while she was still sleeping to take apart a few sections of her front fence, allowing the machinery into her yard.
The operator had dug out every single flowerbed on her property. She’d stood at the fence in her robe, smiling in satisfaction as the huge metal teeth on the front of the bucket had torn into the vegetable patch near the front gate and obliterated it in one scoop.
Within two hours the entire yard had been laid waste, and she wasn’t sorry. It was going to be a ton of work to redo everything, but worth it. This would give her the fresh start she needed, and hopefully erase the awful memories of Paul in and around her home.
“Seriously, what did you do?” she asked as they neared the door. She could hear cars out on the street, the sounds of doors opening and shutting.
“Come on,” he said with a laugh, tugging her to make her move faster.
Poppy slipped on her flip-flops and followed him outside. Sure enough, there was a line of cars parked up and down Honeysuckle Lane. “What on earth…?”
Noah raised her hand to his mouth, kissed it gently. “Surprise.”
The instant they rounded the side of his house, she stopped walking. There in her yard, it seemed like half the population of Crimson Point was gathered. Beckett stood near her back fence, directing people with orders and hand gestures, his officer persona shining through loud and clear.
The buzz of conversation died away when people noticed her and Noah, fading to a hush. Everyone turned to stare at them, some faces Poppy recognized and others she didn’t. “Noah, what is this?” she whispered, afraid she might cry.
“It’s an extreme yard makeover.”
“Oh…” Her free hand flew to her mouth as overwhelming gratitude flooded her. “But I can’t afford all this,” she blurted. “I–”
“You’re not paying for any of it,” a female voice said.
Poppy looked over to see Liz Porter materialize out of the crowd, a smile on her face as she crutched her way toward them, her leg in a cast.
“Hey,” Poppy cried, rushing over to put a hand on her shoulder. “How are you?”
“I’m on the mend. This is my dad,” she said, indicating the tall, well-built man coming up beside her.
The man held his hand out to Poppy. “I can’t thank you enough for what you
did for my daughter.”
“Oh, it was just sheer luck that I was the one who found her—”
“Maybe, but you left your business and went out to help look for her, even though you were new here and didn’t know her.”
“Anyway,” Liz said, laughter shining in her eyes, “like I said, you’re not paying for any of this. When people in town heard what had happened to you, they wanted to help and didn’t know what else to do, so they started up a collection for you at Whale’s Tale. Word spread fast, and nearly everyone in town donated. It’s enough to cover the cost of all the materials and then some. And everyone here is volunteering their time to get the project done.”
Poppy was dumbfounded. Didn’t know what to say. Why? Why would they do something like this for her when they barely knew her?
“You’re one of us now,” Noah told her. “And Crimson Pointers take care of their own.”
“Damn right we do!” someone called out from the back of the crowd. Everyone cheered in agreement.
Tears blurred her eyes. She blinked fast, trying to keep them from falling. “Oh my God, I don’t know what to say.” She was speechless.
“You don’t have to say anything,” Noah murmured, kissing her temple as he wrapped a strong arm around her waist and hugged her to his side. “This is our way of showing you how much we care.”
Poppy’s throat closed up. Everywhere she looked, people were smiling at her. Then someone started clapping. Soon the whole crowd joined in, whistling and cheering.
Poppy gave them a shaky smile and raised her hand in acknowledgment.
Noah grinned and led her over to the throng of people waiting to see her. Everyone wished her well. Some shook her hand. Others gave her hugs.
She recognized many customers from Whale’s Tale. Even Rick from the garden center was there in his red Stalk Market shirt. He nodded at her, gave her a shy smile and stepped back into the crowd.
Her employee Caroline came over to hug her. And at the back fence with Beckett, Sierra stood with a pair of gardening gloves tucked into her hip pocket and a trowel in her hand. Molly was there too, beside Jase and Aidan.
