Saying I Do (Stewart Island Series Book 8)

by Tracey Alvarez

  “I wanted to talk to you.” The first little white lie he’d told her tonight. He wanted her, but he’d settle for talking. Hell, he’d settle for standing in her doorway, towel-drying his hair for two minutes if that’s all the time she’d care to give him. He just wanted—no, needed—to see her again before he headed back to Oban in the morning.

  “Talk, huh?” The dimples were back, and she opened the door wider. “Because that’s what guys want when they show up on my doorstep, dripping wet and sporting a hard-on.”

  He glanced down. Huh. She was observant as well as beautiful. “It’s a medical condition. Spontaneous transient arousal.”

  She snorted and headed up the stairs, leaving him to shut the front door and squelch after her.

  Her living quarters were sparse but eclectic. An enclosed, open-air deck that looked like the original outside brick wall of the building ran along huge sliding glass doors that separated the deck area from the open-plan living room and kitchen. Hardwood floors ran the length of the large room, and the white ceilings gave the feeling of a wide-open space. Her furniture had a retro look about it, including an old-style entertainment unit upon which sat a tiny box of a TV—by today’s standards, anyway—but next to that was a very modern sound system. He noted one wall had a Harley Komeke original hanging on it. Since Harley had moved back to Oban, married Bree, and had a baby, he’d generously gifted a lot of his art to friends. Joe had a stylized Komeke pohutukawa canvas on his wall at home.

  Mac disappeared up another flight of stairs leading, he presumed, to the bed and bathrooms. She returned a minute later with a fluffy white towel. By that time, his spontaneous transient arousal had dissipated, thanks in part to mentally picturing the last case of ingrown toenails he’d treated.

  She handed him the towel, and he gratefully shook it out and scrubbed his face and hair. Kissing Mac had been a mistake. Coming here was a mistake. But both felt unavoidable. The kind of mistakes you knew would have repercussions, but you told yourself you were helpless to avoid making them. When really it was because you wanted to make the damn mistakes and to hell with the consequences.

  He couldn’t hide behind the towel any longer. He lowered it from his face to find Mac only two steps away. Her chest rose and fell at a brisk rate, her nipples two distinct pearls under her thin top. One bra strap slid partway down her arm, and her mouth was bare of the lipstick she’d had on earlier, but her lower lip flushed pink from her teeth that continued to worry it.

  “You’re no longer spontaneously aroused,” she said. “It really was transient.”

  He smothered a grin. “Disappointed?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Give me a minute, and it’ll be back.” He threw the towel on the back of her sofa and stepped toward her.

  Mac took a giant step to the side, her eyes widening. “You’re here because you want me.”

  So. They’d gone past niceties into blunt truth. “Yes.”

  “Even though you don’t like me much.”

  There didn’t appear to be any hurt or self-pity in her tone, just a statement of fact—as she saw it.

  “No.” And that’s where the truth-telling stopped. Because the truth was he did like her—quite a lot. But admitting it wouldn’t do either of them any good. Even a platitude of you’re not so bad or you’re growing on me would lead her to imagine things between them that couldn’t happen. “But you don’t have to like someone to want them.”

  “True. And just to be clear,” she said and wriggled out of her camisole, “I don’t like you either.”

  She wore a lace-edged black bra that made the pale skin of her chest look even paler. While he remained fascinated with the sprinkling of freckles dotting her chest, she hurled her top at him. It didn’t reach his head as she’d likely intended but dropped between them like a glove thrown down in a duel.

  “Good to know.” Joe hauled off his sweater and tossed it to the floor on top of her camisole. Then he peeled off his shirt and added it to the pile.

  Mac’s cheeks sucked in, her gaze locked on his bare chest. “Just so we’re clear.”

  Her yoga pants were thrown down next, leaving Mac in only her bra and, cutely, a pair of pastel-striped cotton panties. She followed his gaze, but instead of covering herself, fisted her hands on her hips.

  “I wasn’t expecting you—and, anyway, I don’t wear matching lingerie for men I don’t like.”

  “Fair enough.” He slipped his belt from his jeans and shucked them down, gratified to hear her sudden intake of breath. His arousal was transient no longer—in fact, his knit boxers felt as if they’d shrunk a size he was so feckin’ hard. He stepped out of his jeans and kicked them over toward the rest of the clothing.

  “There are bits of you I think I’ll like.” She dipped her chin. “Take off the shorts.”

  A petty man would mention she had on two items of clothing still. Joe wasn’t a petty man, and he got rid of the boxers, managing not to fall on his arse in the process. A stripper he was not. Though Mac looked at him with the same hunger women evidently looked at male strippers. Unable to resist the temptation, he took himself in hand for one slow, firm stroke. Her eyelids fluttered to half-mast, and the softest, sexiest sound he’d ever heard escaped her plump pink lips.

  “You’ll do,” she said. “You’ll do fine. Now, come here.”

  If MacKenna Jones thought she’d twist him around her finger in bed during their one and only night together, she’d be sorely disappointed. But given that he couldn’t wait another moment to get his hands on her silky-looking skin, he moved without argument. She reached for him, dragging her fingernails lightly over his chest and down to his abs as he stopped moving, his erection nestling between their bodies and against the warm skin of her upper stomach. The brush of her nipples against him hardened him further, but frustratingly, he couldn’t kiss her without breaking the skin-to-skin contact—and there were bits of her skin still covered.

  He skimmed his hands down her shoulders until he touched her bra strap. He spider-walked his fingertips along the slippery satin, but bloody hell, he couldn’t find the clasp. She quivered, dropping her face so her nose bumped against his chest. Her hands, which had been resting on his waist, suddenly squeezed.

  Shite—nerves? Or change of heart?

  He rubbed her back. “I’m not usually so bad at this. Last year I beat the reigning champion, Ben Harland, at removing a bra in the Manly Man of the Year contest.”

  More quivering from Mac and a snuffle.

  He dropped his hands and arched his chin back. She wasn’t shaking with nerves, she was shaking with—

  “Are you laughing, woman?”

  “Yes.” A fully formed giggle burst out of her as she jabbed a finger to the bra clasp sitting neatly between her wobbling breasts. “Rookie mistake.”

  Generally, when a woman laughed during foreplay, it wasn’t great for a man’s ego. But with Mac it made him want to laugh, too, from the sheer pleasure of hearing the sound.

  “Looks as if I’ll have to prove I’m no rookie.”

  He grinned down at her and flicked open the clasp, her bare breasts spilling into his waiting palms. He scraped his thumbs over her nipples, and her laughter cut off with a jagged gasp.

  “Oh,” she said.

  He dipped his head and captured her mouth in a kiss that was anything but funny. Hot, wet, deep, he took his time, proving there’d be no more laughable moments between them for the next hour at least. She yielded to him, her nails digging into his shoulder muscles, but due to their height difference she wasn’t close enough. So he palmed her two perfect arse cheeks and hauled her up against him. Mac wrapped her legs around his hips, the heat of her pressed tight to his aching hardness. She hooked her arms constrictor tight around his neck, keeping their mouths sealed together, darting her wicked tongue against his until he wondered how he’d ever get them to a horizontal surface without his legs collapsing.

  Because the kind of sex they were going to have�
�the kind of sex that left you knackered and semiconscious hours later—wasn’t going to happen on her spindly vintage sofa. He wanted Mac too fiercely to worry about splintered furniture legs or broken coffee tables.

  Joe headed for the stairs, thankful for his years of hiking steep inclines since he made it to the top without loosening his grip on Mac, who was panting encouragement in his ears.

  “Third door,” she said as he strode down the narrow hallway. “On the left.”

  “I can find my way to your bleedin’ bedroom.” He nudged open the third door on the left and kicked it shut behind them. He carried her to the big bed, flicked on the nightstand light, and sat on the mattress, Mac still wrapped around him like a monkey. “I’ve an uncanny knack for that sort of thing.”

  “Still talking too much.” She grabbed his face in both hands and kissed him again, wriggling her delicious arse in his lap until his eyes crossed.

  Joe ran his hands over her ribs, stroking the soft curve of her breasts, loving the feel of her grinding against him as he discovered the delights of rolling her nipples between his fingers. Touching wasn’t enough. He lay back on the bed, positioning her upper body so he could arch up to reach those rigid tips. Another sexy moan escaped her as he suckled on her warm flesh, flicking and circling his tongue around her nipples until the taste and texture of her was imprinted in his brain.

  He couldn’t get enough, so he flipped her onto her back and eased between her thighs, bracing himself above her. Dropping his mouth to her neck, he traced a line of wet kisses up to her jaw while his hand slipped between them to graze over her panties. She wordlessly begged him to remove the last barrier between them by arching into his fingers and making little mewling sounds as he stroked over the damp cotton between her thighs.

  One other thing he couldn’t wait to taste.

  Joe edged down her body, taking his time to explore the lush terrain of her breasts, the dip of her waist, and the soft pale skin of her stomach. She raised up on her elbows as the breadth of his shoulders forced her thighs farther apart, her breath sucking in as he drew a finger down her panty-covered cleft. Her teeth bit down on her lower lip, and she lifted her hips in silent invitation. He didn’t need asking twice; he’d a knack for this sort of thing.

  Joe quickly divested Mac of her underwear and spread her thighs open with his palms. My God, she was a bite-sized piece of heaven to behold. He planted a hot, wet kiss on her inner thigh and blew on it. He glanced up to find her watching him, a couple of fine wrinkles on her forehead. There was a look of vulnerability in her eyes that hadn’t been there a few minutes ago. The most intimate of acts was one he’d never force on a woman if she weren’t into it as much as he was. And if she didn’t trust him to give her the pleasure she deserved…

  “Will you let me have you, MacKenna?” he asked. “I like this bit of you quite a lot, and I’m dyin’ to have a taste.” He parted her slick folds and rubbed gently at her swollen clit.

  Her hips jerked upward, her breath hitching. “Please,” she gasped.

  He bent and placed his tongue where his fingers had stroked. Her knees clenched against his shoulders, and her hands shoved into his hair as he continued to drive her wild with his lips and tongue. Sweet, sweet MacKenna did indeed taste as amazing as she looked, and as much as his cock throbbed in anticipation of burying itself inside her, he took his time. Gave that one small area of her body a hundred and ten percent of his focus until she bucked beneath his mouth as her climax shattered the last of her inhibitions.

  He held on, devouring her still as she came, the ripples squeezing his fingers which were still buried inside her. Finally, wrung out from her pleasure, she went lax, her fingers stroking through his hair instead of fisting it. He moved up her body and nibbled at her throat.

  “Condom,” she said, her eyes still a little unfocused.

  The sight made him grin.

  “Nightstand,” she added. “Hurry.”

  Completely on board with that plan, Joe rolled away from her, found protection, and suited up. He came back to her, and she twined around him, reaching between them to guide him home. Hesitating as he nudged inside her, he watched her sleepy-eyed gaze grow wide as she stretched around him.

  “All right, then?” he murmured then claimed her mouth in a kiss so devastating he couldn’t even recognize her moaned reply since his heartbeat thundered in his ears.

  Mac’s hips tilted to the perfect angle, and he thrust inside, his cock filling her with such sudden pleasure that he broke their kiss with a moan of his own. Jaysus—so wet and tight, he was enveloped in her warmth. A sensation amplified as she rocked her hips impatiently and hooked her heels over his arse.

  He moved within her, thrusting until he found the right tempo to have her chanting his name. Peeling one of her legs from his hips, he lifted her knee, changing the angle of penetration. He took her over and over until her body clamped and convulsed around his, and his climax rushed through him with a guttural roar.

  He held her for a long time afterward. Just breathing in her scent, feeling her heart pound against his then slow to a sated rhythm. Moving even an inch away from her again seemed an impossibility.

  “Do you want me to leave?” he asked.

  She traced a fingernail around his nipple and snuggled closer into his side, her pointy chin jutting into his chest, hair in disarray since at some point the elastic holding her ponytail had vanished.

  “No. I don’t want to be responsible for you catching your death,” she said. “And”—she ran her hand down over his abs to cup him intimately—“I’m not done with you yet.”

  Joe immediately started to harden, and he grinned, even though she couldn’t see it. “You’re a fine thing, MacKenna Jones, and I’m not done with you either.”

  It could’ve been two hours later or five; Joe had lost count of the seconds, minutes, eons spent in Mac’s bed, discovering her most intimate secrets. Like the cute-as-a-kitten growl she made when he’d teased one breast too long without giving the other equal attention. Like how her little hands were surprisingly strong, and how the blissfully perfect grip she demonstrated when stroking him made him want to weep tears of joy. Like the way she sweetly promised to rock his world a fourth time if he went downstairs and collected their clothes before Laura or Reid came home.

  By the time she’d kicked him out of the warm tangle of duvet, Joe would’ve just about agreed to empty out his bank account for one more minute wrapped around her nakedness.

  Of course, from a medical perspective, the cocktail of feel-good chemicals and hormones gushing through a male brain after spectacularly hot sex made it understandable how many men turned into complete doormats in the afterglow. Once his pleasure neurons had stopped firing, he’d be right as rain. And he’d have satisfied the annoying, unreachable-up-until-now itch that was MacKenna.

  He padded down the darkened hallway, following the glow of lights still on downstairs in the living room. His stomach rumbled as he hit the bottom of the staircase, reminding him that he hadn’t eaten since lunchtime. Clothes, then he’d raid Mac’s fridge for a bite, he told himself as he squinted against the living room’s bright light and headed for the pile of discarded clothes. The woman couldn’t expect a quality repeat performance from a man suffering from an empty stomach. He needed fuel; he needed—

  “That’s an image burned into my retina I could do without.” A voice sounded from behind him.

  A male voice, coming from MacKenna’s kitchen.

  Joe whirled, his gaze zipping across the clean white lines of the countertops to where Reid leaned against one with a giant sandwich raised halfway to his mouth.

  Joe had three options in dealing with the situation. One, go on the offensive. Two, apologize for walking around bare-arsed. He wasn’t entirely sure what the man’s relationship with Mac was now or in the past, but the thought of getting the living shite beat out of him for shagging her senseless didn’t have much appeal.

  Which left option three. B
razen it out, but make no sudden moves.

  He continued to stroll to the heap of clothing and pick up his boxer shorts from the top of the pile. “What’s the story?”

  “You tell me,” Reid said as Joe pulled on his underwear. “It’s three in the morning, you’re naked in my house, and there’s a bra hanging off the lamp. The plot of this story is kinda predictable.”

  Reid took a sizeable bite of his sandwich and chewed.

  Joe slitted his gaze at the side table, where MacKenna’s black bra did indeed dangle from the lampshade. So that’s where it went.

  “It wasn’t a rhetorical question,” he said. “It’s an expression.” Boxers on and not feeling quite as exposed, Joe stepped into his jeans, zipped, and buttoned. If Reid intended to have at him, he was buggered if he’d trade blows in his underwear.

  He walked over to one of the barstools on the other side of the counter and eased down onto it. He couldn’t say why he didn’t disappear back upstairs with Mac’s clothes and pretend he’d never seen the other man. Certainly would’ve been easier, less confrontational, and sometimes walking away was the right thing to do. He could attest to that. But he was curious about Reid and exactly what role he played in Mac’s life.

  “You have a problem with me and Mac?” Joe asked.

  Reid gave him a you’re a dead man stare and washed down his sandwich with whatever was in the mug beside him. “Is there a you and Mac?”

  Some sort of tea, because a dangling tea bag tail was draped over the mug’s rim. Not a decent Irish Breakfast blend, though, or even—try not to scoff—an Earl Grey. But a flowery-fruity smelling tea bag that had turned the hot water in the mug purple.

  “What if there is? She can sleep with whoever she likes.” Nice one, Joe. Resorting to high school level conversational skills.

  “Can she?”

  Joe rethought the last part of his outburst, a creeping, sickened feeling gathering in his gut at the image rising in his brain of Mac in bed with another man.

  “No. Not unless it’s me.”