Falling for Her

by Sandra Owens

  The door opened the two inches the safety chain allowed, and she peeked out, only one eye showing around the edge. “Jamie?”

  “In the flesh. We need to talk.”

  “Give me a minute to dress.”

  “Are you naked?” Parts of him hoped for a yes, but his saner self knew it’d be best if she wore a burqa, covering her from head to toe. Even then, she’d probably manage to look sexy in the thing.

  “No, but—”

  “It’s important. Let me in.” Preferably, before her watcher took it in his head to return and caught him talking to her. The door closed, the chain rattling against the wood. When it swung open again, whatever he’d been about to say vanished.

  An almost-sheer white cotton top with thin straps did little to hide her perfect breasts. The hem of her shirt stopped about two inches above her only other article of clothing—purple boxers barely covering the cheeks of her bottom.

  God help him if he started drooling like a slobbering hound on the scent. Unable to control his eyes, his gaze roamed over her, down to her bare feet and blue painted toenails. She hiked one foot up, curling it behind her knee.

  “What do you want from me, Jamie?”

  He jerked his gaze up to hers. Everything. He pushed past her and closed the door behind him. To get his mind settled and off her bare legs and the rest of her, he roamed her living room. Stopping in front of a picture of a couple walking on the beach, a child of around three or four between them, he picked it up.

  “This you and your parents?”

  “Yeah,” she said, but her concentration was on the line her toes were making in the carpet.

  The woman was lying through her teeth. Why would she claim as hers a photo of some miscellaneous pretend family? Unless he missed his guess, the picture had come with the frame. Setting the silver frame back in its place, he continued his inspection of her things with her following close behind. He was unnerving her, as was his intention. Nervous people tended to let things slip. Being close enough to feel her heat and smell her coconutty scent was setting him on edge—a thing he kept hidden. Barely.

  “Stop touching my things, and tell me why you’re here.” She grabbed the porcelain cat from his hand and set it back on the shelf with a bang.

  “Speaking of felines, where’s yours?” Thinking he’d gotten his lust under control, he turned to face her. Wrong. As long as she stood before him in that skimpy outfit, he was going to have trouble focusing.

  “Sleeping over there on the counter,” she said, waving a hand toward the kitchen.

  “What?”

  She tilted her head, her brows furrowing. “Junior. You asked where he was.”

  “Right.” The cat. Pay attention eyes. Stay above neck level. Because his disobedient orbs refused to listen and remained on her breasts, he turned away and strode to the dang cat. He was there for a reason, and it was not to see how fast he could get her undressed.

  Jamie idly scratched Junior’s chin as his attention turned to the laptop standing open next to the cat. On the screen, a headline from a newspaper article caught his eye, and he quickly scanned it. Unsurprisingly, Sugar slammed the lid closed when she realized he was reading it, but he’d seen enough to get a name and more.

  “Who’s Rodney Vanders?” Besides the chief of police of Vanders, South Carolina, who was currently on vacation in an undisclosed beach location.

  “No one.”

  Right. Nobodies—one likely from several generations of nobodies—got towns named after them every day. How was he supposed to help her if she refused to trust him? Maybe he should walk away, putting Sugar Darling out of his life. He eyed the door. If he was smart, he’d do exactly that.

  A breath of air huffed out of her. “You said you needed to talk to me. About what?”

  She looked so vulnerable standing there in her bare feet, her eyes wary . . . or was that fear in them? “You’re in troub—”

  Her phone rang, scaring both her and the cat. Junior leapt off the counter and disappeared down the hall. Sugar held her hand over her heart and stared at the cell phone on the counter as if it might bite her if she touched it.

  “Aren’t you going to answer it?”

  Wide eyes lifted to his, and she shook her head.

  Jamie picked it up. Caller blocked. Interesting. He punched Talk and brought the cell to his ear, but didn’t speak. At first, there was silence, then the sound of soft breathing.

  Sugar tried to grab the phone from him, but he slipped his hand around her wrist and held on to her. He’d bet his next paycheck the breather was the chief of police of Vanders, South Carolina, and the bastard who had once tried to drown her to teach her a lesson. The man who’d put a scar on her shoulder with a belt or whip. The same one who had sent an ex-con to retrieve her.

  After a brief internal debate, Jamie decided not to invite the man over for a little talk. Better to learn his enemy—rather, Sugar’s enemy—first. Once he knew what he . . . she was up against, he’d arrange a discussion with Mr. Vanders and invite him to leave Sugar alone or else. Not that he expected the man to give up that easily, but it’d only be fair to give him a chance to live another day.

  Sugar tried to pull her arm away from Jamie’s hold on her. She desperately wanted to push him out the door, but his grip was unrelenting. Although she’d almost convinced herself earlier it hadn’t been Rodney calling and breathing into her ear, this second time pretty much snatched the hope out from under her feet.

  For sure, it was time to pack up and leave, but the blue-eyed warrior taking up too much space in her kitchen seemed to think he had the right to nose into her business. She could almost see him brandishing a sword while daring the villain to take him on, and she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

  But nothing about her life was funny, and that was the sad truth. Jamie wanted answers she couldn’t and wouldn’t give him. Rodney was not his problem. Not that she didn’t think Jamie could hold his own against the biggest bully to walk the face of the earth, but why should he? He owed her nothing.

  Lusted after her, sure. She could see the heat in his eyes when he looked at her. But that didn’t give him the right to know the intimate details of her past. She’d be mortified should it come to that. Jamie was honorable, a man who’d gone to war to protect his country, a man who held himself to the highest standards while she was—as far as the law was concerned—a thief and an accessory to a murder.

  No way could he ever love her.

  “Let me go,” she said when he set the phone back on the counter. He dropped his hold on her so fast she stumbled backwards before catching her footing. With as much dignity as she could manage, she lifted her chin and put her hands on her hips. “Go home, Jamie. I don’t want you here.” That just might have been the biggest lie of her life.

  His lips thinned in obvious displeasure. “So you’re okay with me leaving you alone even though there’s a man watching your condo? If I had to guess, I’d say a private eye hired by someone to keep an eye on you.” He glanced at the closed computer, then scowled. “Rodney Vanders, maybe? And what about the man we’re holding at K2? You forget about him, Sugar?”

  Oh, God. Her knees gave out, and she sank to the floor. It was just all too much.

  Jamie squatted in front of her and put his finger under her chin, lifting her face. “Sugar, what’s going on? You know I can help you. Why won’t you tell me?”

  No, she couldn’t tell him. If she did and he decided to go after Rodney and got hurt, she’d never forgive herself. She had to leave as soon as she could get him out of her house. But first, there was one thing she wanted from him, to know how making love to a man was really supposed to be.

  It would mean letting him put his penis in her, but he wasn’t Rodney and wouldn’t hurt her. That she knew to the bottom of her heart. Taking his hand, she stood, pulling him up with her, and turned tow
ard the bedroom.

  “Sugar?”

  When he pulled her to a stop, she put a finger over his lips. “Don’t talk. Don’t ask questions. Don’t do anything but follow me.” No was in his eyes; she could see it clear as day. “Please, Jamie. I’ve never asked you for anything, but I’m asking for this. I need you to hold me, to make love to me. I need it like I’ve never needed anything in my life.”

  Lifting onto her toes, she put her hands on his waist and pressed her lips to his. Hands at his sides, he stood as still as a statue and almost as rigid as an unyielding slab of granite.

  “Please,” she whispered against his lips, wishing for the first time in her life she knew how to seduce a man. Instinctively, she licked her tongue across the seam of his mouth. Other than a slight flexing of his muscles under her palms, he gave no reaction. Defeated, heartbroken, she lowered her heels back to the floor and prepared to send him on his way.

  “Damn you, Sugar.”

  Faster than she could blink, she was swept off her feet and carried to her bed, where she was unceremoniously dropped onto the mattress. Afraid she might say the wrong thing, she stayed silent as he stared down at her. His eyes had gone a turbulent blue and she couldn’t tell if they reflected anger or desire. Maybe a little of both. Anger for sure if he was back to cursing, and the desire could just be wishful thinking.

  He reached into his back pocket and removed his wallet, opened it and pulled out a condom. Sugar fisted her hands as anticipation warred with fear of what was going to happen. Setting the foil package on the nightstand, he tugged his T-shirt over his head and dropped it on the floor. She’d thought he would undress her first, but no. His jeans soon joined his shirt and he stood before her clad only in a pair of dark blue briefs.

  God above, he was magnificent, and it was a sight she’d carry with her forever.

  The thin arrow of golden hair running down the middle of his stomach caught her attention. Her gaze fell to the huge bulge in his underwear, and she swallowed hard. She wasn’t Hannah, she was Sugar, a woman with no reason to be afraid of joining with a man. When he pushed the briefs down his hips and stepped out of them, she kept her gaze to his face.

  “If you can’t look at me without the panic I see on your face, I won’t do this. Tell me you want me, Sugar.”

  The barest hint of warmth had entered his eyes, and she took courage in understanding he was giving her the choice of what happened next. That he’d purposely undressed first told her he remembered their last night together, and if she wanted him in her bed, she’d have to show him that seeing him aroused didn’t make her feel sick.

  For a moment, it did. But she swallowed the bile rising in her throat and gave herself a stern lecture that he wasn’t Rodney, and she was being stupid. Jamie was what she wanted, and as the thought settled in, her stomach calmed and she lowered her gaze to his erection.

  Oh, yes, she wanted him. “I do. I do want you, Jamie.”

  With a new resolve and heat traveling through her veins, she lifted her hand and circled her fingers around his cock . . . wasn’t that what men liked to call it? Before Jamie, she’d thought of it as that thing she didn’t want anywhere near her. Now, she had a whole new appreciation for the appendage, and wasn’t that a wonderful thing?

  “I wouldn’t want to be a man if I had to walk around all day with that between my legs, but it’s strangely fascinating.” She sat up and traced the shape of it, then lifted it and peered underneath.

  “What are you doing, woman?”

  “Studying it,” she answered, pleased to hear the amusement in his voice. “To address your concern, it’s not at all as scary as I’d expected, and there’ll be no repeat of my embarrassing behavior like last time.”

  “That’s a relief.” He took her hand away and sat next to her. “Are you sure about this? I won’t deny the minute I first saw you, I wanted you. As much as I tried not to, I couldn’t stop thinking about you.” When she didn’t reply, his eyelids lowered, and he shifted his face away from her. “Maybe I should leave.”

  “No.” She placed her hand on his leg to stop him from standing. “I need you to understand I’m not looking for anything permanent. I just want . . .” How much to tell him? Enough so he’d understand that what would happen next meant something to her, but not so much to scare him away. “I was chosen by Rodney . . . I don’t remember, did I ever tell you that was his name?” When he didn’t respond, she said, “Anyway, when I was fifteen, and from then on, I was never allowed friends or outside interests. I don’t think of him by anything but bad cop.”

  “He took you at fifteen? Where the hell were your parents?”

  Never had she heard such anger in a voice, not even from Rodney at his worst. Although he didn’t know it, his rage was on behalf of Hannah, a girl no one had cared enough about to protect, and Sugar willed herself not to cry.

  “No, he chose me, but he waited to take me until after I’d finished high school. As for my parents, my mom died when I was ten, and my father changed after that, started drinking and not spending much time at home. Then he met Rodney. I-I don’t want to share all the sordid details of my life after that. All I want is this one night with you, to know how it feels to have a man make love to me. I don’t consider the things Rodney did making love.”

  “I’d like to have a word with your father. How could he—”

  “Shhh. No more questions. Will you give me this one night? Please, Jamie.” His thigh muscle tensed under her hand and she waited, half expecting him to get up and walk out.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  How do I say no to that?” He should. The woman looking at him with uncertainty in her eyes had ghosts plaguing her, and Jamie had enough of his own ghosts to contend with. Hearing her speak of the man who’d chosen a fifteen-year-old girl—then had mistreated her so badly—made him want to break something, preferably one Rodney Vanders.

  The last thing he wanted was a relationship with a beautiful, hurting woman needing the soft touch of a man. Even though she’d said just one night, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to walk away if he laid her down on her bed and shared such an intimate act as joining their bodies.

  Just lust, he thought, lying to himself. He’d lusted plenty up to the day he’d killed his parents and never had it felt like this. Still, as much as he should, he couldn’t deny her. If all she wanted was one night, so be it.

  “Thank you for not saying no,” she said, her whispered words calling to something so deep inside him he couldn’t begin to answer her.

  Instead, he gently pushed her down onto the bed. Knowing that she’d been mistreated, maybe even brutalized, he was determined to touch her so softly she would think she’d made love to a gossamer angel.

  Stretching out beside her, he lowered his hand over her stomach so that his palm covered her belly button, his fingers spread over her soft, silky skin. “You’re dangerous, Sugar Darling.”

  “That’s silly. I’m not even close to dangerous.”

  “To me you are,” he said, lowering his mouth to hers. Slipping his hand under the little T-shirt as he kissed her, he brushed his fingertips over a breast. So soft. So warm. He flicked her nipple with his thumb, causing her to sigh into his mouth.

  What kind of fool did it take to not see how innately sensual she was, instead, mistreating her so badly she’d gotten sick at the thought of making love to a man? If he could give her nothing else, he’d show her how it was supposed to be between a man and a woman, how good it could be. Deep in his bones, he knew she planned to leave. If nothing else, he would be doing her a favor, and the next time she met someone she liked, she’d know sex didn’t have to hurt.

  If it bothered him to think of her with another man, he’d get over it.

  As he gently caressed her other breast, he understood this woman needed tender, kind hands on her. The last time they’d been in bed together, it had seemed to help
when he’d talked to her, telling her what he was going to do.

  “I’m going to take off your shirt, sweetheart, so I can see these beautiful breasts I’m touching. Okay?”

  Her lips curved up as she grinned. “I was beginning to think we were going to do this with you naked and me clothed.”

  Knowing some of her past, the trust in her eyes—darkened to a deep violet now—would have brought him to his knees if he’d been standing. “You’re definitely going to end up naked, baby. Shirt off.” He helped her pull it over her head and sucked in a breath at seeing the pale pink nipples peaked from desire. There should have been warnings tattooed on her body that read, “Jamie, no return past this point.”

  “You ready for your shorts to come off? And you should know I might die if you say no.” Her laugh rolled though him like some kind of healing balm injected straight into his veins, and he found himself laughing with her, although he couldn’t explain what was so funny as they dissolved into gasping giggles.

  Saint didn’t laugh, something the guys had tried but failed to make happen for years with their stupid jokes and silly faces. There was a standing bet among them that the first one to set him off would collect five hundred bucks from the others. What would they think if they knew a beautiful but damaged woman had him giggling like an eight-year-old girl high on sugar at a slumber party?

  “Tell me why we’re laughing, Sugar,” he said when he’d caught his breath and could speak. That set her off once more, and taking him by surprise, she twisted up and straddled him, dangling those beautiful breasts in front of his face.

  “Because at this particular moment we’re so happy we can’t help it?”

  “Could be.” It was as good a reason as any. She rocked against him, settling herself so that the outer lips of her folds hugged his erection. Even with the barrier of her little boxers, her heat seared him, and he gritted his teeth against his raging desire.

  “Can I take my shorts off now, Jamie?”

  Never had he been asked a stupider question. “God, yes.”