Wild Fire (Wild State)

by Edie Harris

  He’d always felt so damn grateful that she had somehow managed to see beyond the blood on his hands to the man beneath, and that man worshipped her with a vehemence that would likely shock her, should she truly know its depth.

  What shocked him, however, was learning how unable she was to let go of her own past.

  His thumb stroked the soft skin along the back of her hand. “But we also don’t talk much about the future.”

  This time, her “no” was slower, considering.

  He released his frustration on a heavy sigh. “That future’s not going anywhere. We’re living it whether we want to or not, and Moira, honey, I want to. I wanna live that future with you something fierce, no matter what it brings for us.”

  Her fingers tightened around his. “I don’t want you to regret this. Regret me.”

  He slid a palm around her nape, urging her closer until his lips hovered over hers. “You’re my woman, Moira Crawford. I’ll never regret that. Never.”

  The kiss stole his breath, and hers, and they both moaned as her hands fisted in his hair, the delicious sting to his scalp urging him to deepen the caress of lips and tongue until the air around them turned hot with their desire.

  He pulled back, just an inch, listening to her panting breaths, lustful excitement turning her gaze sultry. As he watched, a blush flared to life beneath her freckles, and he struggled to breathe as desperate wanting swept over him. “You beauty,” he croaked. “Come here.”

  “Del—”

  “I wanna love you, honey. Come here.”

  She fell into his lap, smelling of soot, sweat, and woman. He wrapped his arms around her and buried his face against her neck, breathing her into his lungs. She was better than air, and far more potent, and the arousal stirred by their kiss fanned into a flame that rivaled the wildfire climbing the mountainside this very minute.

  Feeling him harden against her, she wiggled in his lap, and he nipped her throat lightly in warning. Breath warm on his cheek, her lips brushed his ear as she whispered, “Let me love you, Del.”

  Not needing a second invitation, he stood, intending to strip, but she stopped him with a hand on his hip. He watched as she slid from the cot to kneel in front of him, hands hovering over the waistband of his trousers. “Put your hands on the bars.”

  He sucked in a breath at her command but did as he was told. The vertical iron bars of the cell were cool beneath his palms, and he gripped them until his knuckles paled. “What are you doin’ to me, honey?”

  Her nimble fingers made quick work of his buttons, and then she was reaching inside to grip him. Firmly. “Loving you, of course.”

  For the second time that day, he determined that there really was no of course about it, but when she smiled up at him, blue eyes mischievous and fingers holding him oh, so nicely, he decided not to question his good fortune. He would never take for granted that she wanted him, that she loved him, but not because he doubted her. He doubted nothing when it came to the two of them.

  His mind blanked when her lips covered the head of his erection, wet, hot, providing agonizing suction as her tongue swiftly found the sensitive spot beneath his crown. “Oh, fuck,” he breathed, wanting to close his eyes but needing to watch his wife pleasure him to madness. Kneeling before him in a dress streaked with dirt and ash, trapped between the bars and his looming body, she was a goddess.

  A goddess with a mouth designed to kill him. “God, Moira, if you’re going to do it, do it. Don’t tease me.” He meant to growl the words, but they came out more like begging.

  He felt more than heard her chuckle as she opened her mouth to take him in. All of him, until he nudged the back of her throat. Auburn lashes fluttered down as she moaned and swallowed, a pretty pink flush mottling her freckled cheeks as she destroyed him with the perfection of her mouth.

  Shuddering, he gripped the bars tighter, fighting not to finish right then and there. “Don’t wanna come yet,” he muttered, and threw his head back, eyes squeezed shut. Maybe if he didn’t see what she was doing.

  Nope, not helping. “Don’t make me come.” Again, he couldn’t tell if it was a warning or a plea, but either way, she heeded him, and with one last torturous lap of her tongue, she slid up his body to tear at his clothing.

  He helped her with his shirt and trousers, kicking off his boots before he grabbed for her, taking her mouth in a harsh kiss that spoke of the need boiling in his veins. This was nothing like the lazy loving they’d attempted that morning. This was heady, dizzying, and it blazed through him until the hands roving over her strong, slender body shook.

  “So many goddamn layers,” he bit out as he tugged and yanked at her various buttons and tapes. Their hands tangled, and their heads knocked together as they fought with her garments. Eventually, she was naked—dear God, was she ever naked—and he caught her up against him with one arm and deposited her on the cot, following her down.

  Her hands were greedy as they danced over his bare shoulders, touching and stroking and stoking the heat within him to the point of pain. Reaching between their bodies, he found her, as wet as if he’d spent an hour teasing her with his mouth, and groaned. “In you.”

  “Yes.”

  He rubbed the head of his cock through her slickness, making her writhe beneath him as he teased them both. But even as he recognized the retribution he was offering, he didn’t want to punish her.

  He just wanted to love her. “Moira.” With a single, controlled thrust of his hips, he slid deep.

  “Yes. Delaney, yes.”

  Tight, so tight. Being inside her was the closest he would ever come to heaven, and he’d never trade it for the real thing. Never in a thousand years. He rocked into her, relishing the feel of her nails scoring his upper back, delighting in the tight clamp of her thighs over his hips. “You’re so good, honey. God, it’s so damn good.”

  She clenched intimately around him. “I love you,” she breathed and, without any warning, came in a rush, eyes closed and head tipped back on the cot as she screamed his name. With a tortured groan, he followed her into ecstasy.

  After their breathing had calmed and he’d rolled to the side, she loosed a sad sigh. “The house…”

  “It’s just a house, Moira.” He cupped her cheek, leaning in to brush his lips over hers. “It ain’t a home unless you’re in it with me.”

  The quiet that fell between them as they lay curled around each other on the narrow cot was easy, comfortable as it hadn’t been in far too long. Her head on his shoulder, her hand clasped in his atop his chest, he breathed a contented sigh. A future of this, just this and only this, wouldn’t be the worst fate to befall a man with a battered past.

  “Delaney?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Do you think it’s illegal to make love in a jail cell?”

  He chuckled, hearing a trace of her usual impishness in the query. “If it’ll ease your conscience, I can lock us both up for the night.” Lifting her hand to his lips, he took the tip of one finger gently between his teeth. “Though I think it might defeat the purpose.”

  She laughed, a real laugh, for the first time in months, and it was the most glorious sound he’d ever heard.

  Author’s Note

  Del and Moira had a whirlwind courtship in Wild Burn, knowing one another for little more than a week before declaring their love. I always thought they needed an epilogue, and so Wild Fire came to be. I consider this short novella an extended epilogue peeking into their lives together a little ways down the road. As with most couples, their story doesn’t end at the Happily Ever After—the Crawfords will face trials, weather storms, and come out on the other side with their marriage stronger than ever. I hope to be able to offer you more glimpses of this pair as the series moves forward.

  Ready for a sneak peek at the upcoming contemporary holiday novella, Sparked?

  “I think…I think I have to give up on him.” It hurt to admit, but Sadie Bower had failed.

  Sadie wasn’t used to failing at an
ything. When she’d told her parents she wasn’t going to the London School of Economics like her older brother Kai, but instead the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, she had assured them that she would succeed as an actress. From the moment she’d aced her first professional audition—unfortunately for a Beckett play, but beggars couldn’t be choosers—her promise had held true.

  Two years ago, Sadie had received her first Oscar nomination. Failure wasn’t even on her radar these days.

  But when it came to Ryan Young, she was nothing but a seething mass of fails. And it was time to move on. “It’s silly for me to keep hoping he’ll change his mind.”

  “Did something happen?” Fiona O’Brien brushed shimmering highlight powder over Sadie’s pale cheeks before stepping back to examine her handiwork. Sadie had met the makeup artist working on a film earlier this year—the premiere for which both women were attending in a couple of hours—and, since wrapping Vendetta in early July, had struck up a fledgling friendship with the brunette.

  Which was why Fiona was now in Sadie’s spacious three-story home, built along one of the coveted Venice canals, helping her with her hair and makeup prior to the premiere.

  Sadie sighed, utterly and embarrassingly morose over the subject of Ryan. “Nothing specific happened, no. But I can only pursue him so long before it’s just awkward for both of us, right?”

  Packing away her brushes into a travel case, Fiona shook her head. “I’d be more inclined to agree with you if I hadn’t seen firsthand the way he looks at you when you’re not looking.”

  “I’ve been looking.” Frustration gnawed at her, making her chest ache, and she lifted one manicured hand to rub at the offending spot. “I feel as though all I’ve done is look, look, look.” Catching Fiona’s sympathetic gray gaze, she shrugged, helpless. “I haven’t seen him since reshoots in September. He won’t return my calls. Or my e-mails.”

  Fiona winced. “That’s probably not a good sign.”

  Scowling, Sadie stalked across the bedroom to where the designer gown her stylist had delivered that morning hung in a black garment bag. “Probably not,” she agreed as she unzipped the bag to reveal a sliver of gold satin. “I was hoping you’d have some sort of sage advice for me.”

  Fiona laughed as she plopped down at the foot of Sadie’s giant bed, tucking her bare feet with their hot-pink painted toenails beneath her. “If only being in a relationship actually made me wise. Please try to remember who I’m dating.”

  The happiness that laced Fiona’s teasing made Sadie uncomfortably envious. Sadie’s Vendetta costar, Declan Murphy, had fallen fast and hard for his makeup artist last spring, and only a few short months later had moved into Fiona’s newly acquired Pasadena home with her. The couple had invited Sadie and other cast and crew from the movie over several times in the intervening months between the end of shooting in Italy and the start of post-production back in Los Angeles, and every time she visited their cute little bungalow—and was forced to return to her big, empty house afterward—Sadie had to battle back waves of bitterness.

  She and Ryan could’ve been just as happy as Fiona and Declan, if only he hadn’t decided their history meant nothing to him.

  If only he hadn’t made her feel like a fool for believing that same history connected them somehow.

  As the garment bag fell away, Sadie took in the gown her stylist had chosen for her to wear on this evening’s red carpet. A column sheath of warm champagne satin, flowing down to a swirl of abstractly placed sequins from knee to hem, ranging in hue from pearly white to deep amber. The draped neckline was high in front and would brush her collarbones, but the dress left the wearer’s back bare, from her nape to the base of her spine. Simple, elegant, and with a surprising sensual twist, she couldn’t have chosen better herself.

  From behind her, Fiona sighed enviously. “Now that is one gorgeous gown.”

  Yes, it was. Shoving thoughts of Ryan aside, Sadie turned to beam at her friend. “Isn’t it just?” She eyed the garment bag on the bed next to Fiona. “And? Let’s compare.”

  Fiona adjusted her glasses on her nose as she glared at the bag that housed her own dress for tonight’s event. “Nope. There’s a reason you’re a movie star and I’m not. And that reason is better clothes.” She petted the garment bag almost mournfully. “It’s okay, Elie Saab,” she murmured consolingly to the bag. “It’s not your fault Sadie has a secret cabal of angel seamstresses slaving away to turn clouds and fairy dust into magical princess dresses.”

  Laughing, Sadie unbuttoned the well-worn, blue men’s dress shirt she’d donned over her lingerie in order for Fiona to do her hair and makeup. “If I had a secret cabal of anything, it wouldn’t be angelic seamstresses.” She pulled her gown from its hanger and, lowering it to pool in a fall of shining satin, stepped into it. “The cabal would need to be something cool. Like ninja monkey assassins.”

  “Or Rodents of Unusual Size.”

  “Exactly.” Settling the sleeveless bodice into place, Sadie turned to examine her appearance in the full-length mirror on the wall to the left of her walk-in closet. “There’s only so much one can do with seamstresses.”

  In the mirror, she watched as Fiona smiled and shook her head. “I dunno. When the end product is that”—she waved her hand at Sadie—“I can see the appeal of having one of those angels on hand. You look amazing.” Fiona paused. “Definitely amazing enough to catch Ryan’s eye tonight. If that’s what you’re aiming for.”

  Barefoot, Sadie moved to the mahogany dresser opposite the mirror and opened the velvet jewelry case that had been delivered along with the gown. Nestled inside were a pair of long ruby-and-rose-gold drop earrings and a matching cuff bracelet. She slid the pieces into place before turning to face Fiona. “Except I’m giving up, remember? Waving the white flag of surrender and whatnot.”

  Fiona began to shed her clothes—first the skinny jeans, then the pink-and-white checked shirt that made her look almost too wholesome for the L.A. scene. One would never guess that she was a native, born and bred into the Hollywood movie business. “You know Ryan is a friend,” she said quietly.

  “Yes.” It didn’t matter that the two weren’t close—Fiona had a connection to Ryan that Sadie didn’t, and it stung.

  Turning her back, Fiona whipped off her tank top and unzipped the garment bag, pulling out a long dress of garnet-colored silk adorned with tiny glass beads of a red so deep as to be almost black. “I met him through Wes, obviously,” she said, naming Vendetta’s director. “Because I meet everyone through Wes, it seems.” There was a smile in Fiona’s voice as she spoke of her longtime friend. “Anyway, the point is, I think Ryan’s a good guy.”

  So did Sadie, and that was the problem.

  “I mean, he’s great at his job,” Fiona continued, speaking over her shoulder to Sadie as she maneuvered the dark red gown into place. “From what I hear, he was pretty much locked in his studio for weeks working on getting the sound mixed correctly. Wes says he’s a perfectionist.”

  “He’s…something.” He hadn’t allowed Sadie close enough to discover whether the man was as precise as the boy had been. Though to call Ryan a boy when she’d first met him all those years ago was a disservice to the memory.

  He’d been a man to her.

  Fiona turned to reveal the front of her dress. Gauzy three-quarter-length sleeves clung to her arms, and the plunging V-neckline came to a point over her sternum, revealing a good deal of her chest in the process. Yet the effect wasn’t sloppy—Fiona looked warm and touchable.

  Sadie grinned. “Declan is going to lose his shit when he sees you.”

  Winking, Fiona yanked the elastic tie from her hair, letting the medium-brown waves fall loosely around her shoulders. “That’s kinda what I’m aiming for.” She gathered a small toiletries case from inside the traveling makeup kit she’d brought to use on Sadie and indicated the adjoining master bath with a tilt of her head. “I’m going to pop in my contact lenses and do my face. Join me?”

&n
bsp; Sadie followed her into the well-lit bathroom, perching on the edge of the claw-foot tub she’d designed the entire room around. “I know Ryan’s a decent man, and I know he’s a brilliant sound engineer. What I don’t like,” she said, frowning down at her hands as Fiona got to work at the vanity, “is how he just…shut me out. From the very beginning.”

  For a moment, Fiona was quiet, and Sadie waited patiently for her response. What she’d come to learn about her new friend was that Fiona didn’t like to rush into things—something that must’ve irked the hell out of her when Declan pursued her so avidly. No, Fiona was a careful woman, with both her person and her words, and Sadie respected her all the more for it.

  “You two were together once, right?” Fiona asked with her trademark caution. “I don’t know the story, but you’ve implied that you have a past.”

  The reason Fiona didn’t know the story was because Sadie didn’t like telling it. Not that it was a bad story—no, it was an amazing story, the sort of meet-cute the industry built blockbuster rom-coms around. Or had done, before the romantic comedy fell out of favor.

  Perhaps the universe was trying to tell Sadie something with that.

  She tapped her nails against the tub’s rounded lip. “‘Together’ is a strong word. We were…we met a long time ago, when I still lived in London. I fell for him, fast.” Too fast. She could see that now, when faced with giving up on the hope she’d carried inside her all this time. She must have come off like a crazy person, insisting they were thrown together again for a reason, and that they’d be stupid not to find out what, precisely, that reason was.