The guy was yelling at me to stay back—he was barely less scared than Louise, now. When he’d backed up enough to reach the wall and I still kept coming, he finally realized threats weren’t going to work. He pushed Louise in one direction and ran in the other, towards the door.
I caught him just as he reached it and slammed his head into the metal. He crumpled to the floor.
The room was suddenly still. Louise and I stared at each other, both of us panting. Then she was running towards me.
I folded her into my arms and she pressed her wet, sobbing face against my chest. I thought the pain inside me would ease, knowing she was safe, but it got worse. This was my fault.
“I thought they were here for the weed,” she managed between tearful gulps of air. “But they said they knew you. They were getting revenge….”
I hugged her even tighter. Rocked her, too. Inside, I was planning all the things I was going to do to the two Serbians when they woke up...if they woke up. But most of my anger was reserved for myself. I’d brought this down on her. Me.
“It’ll be okay,” I promised her. And I swore inside that it would. I’d never go near her again. Never get close enough that her soft skin and copper hair and those lush green eyes could draw me in. Because I’d woken up to something. The way I’d felt when I’d realized she was in danger….
Somewhere along the way, I’d fallen for her. It wasn’t just me lusting after her, anymore. Maybe it never had been. I knew I wouldn’t be happy unless I could be with her. And that was impossible: tonight was evidence of that.
“Come on,” I told her. “I’ll take you home.”
One more month, I thought. One more month. I’ll see her as little as possible, we’ll finish the crop and save Kayley. And then I’m out of her life forever.
Louise
Sean drove me home in my car and saw me to my door. When I asked what he was going to do with the two guys, he said he’d take care of it, and that I never had to worry about them again.
I didn’t have to ask what that meant. And however much my stomach turned at the thought of it, I’d be lying if I said a little part of me didn’t light up with the dark glow of vengeance.
Stacey’s face fell when she saw me. I couldn’t tell her anything, which only made her worry more, and Kayley had woken up and was pale-faced with concern, too. Eventually, Stacey and I managed to get her back to sleep and I dozed fitfully on the couch, leaning against Stacey’s side.
In the morning, I made up a story about a bust pipe at the garden store causing a flood, and all of us being summoned in to help clear it up, and a guy at work saying something that had upset me. I wasn’t sure either of them bought it and I hated having to lie to them. It seemed like I was lying more, every day, just to keep the grow house covered up.
When I returned to the grow house the next day, the two guys were gone and Sean had put the plants back on the tables. I taped up the ones with damaged stems—with proper care, I hoped they’d survive.
A week went by and I didn’t see Sean at all: I was there in the day and him at night. I told myself it was better, this way. I’d seen the darkness that surrounded his life. I’d been right all along about the danger that came with being close to him.
But none of that stopped me from wanting him. It was more than just lust, now. I needed him in my life.
Then, one day, the alarm on my phone went off, triggered by the sensors at the house. I checked what the numbers were telling me, my jaw going slack in disbelief. Then I ran for the elevator and tapped out a text message to Sean on the way down.
PLANTS ARE DYING.
Sean
I screeched to a stop outside the grow house and ran for the door. Louise’s text had been short on detail so I burst in ready for anything...except what I found.
Louise was stretched out on the floor, naked.
Almost naked. She was in bra and panties except—
She was wet with sweat and they’d gone almost translucent.
“Close the door!” Louise yelled. Her voice was muffled because her head and shoulders were inside a large metal box screwed to the wall. I slammed the door behind me.
That’s when I noticed the heat. It was scorching outside, one of the last really hot days of the summer. But inside, it was like an oven.
“It’s the air conditioning,” said Louise. “It broke, probably some time this morning. The place has been getting hotter and hotter all day, until it got hot enough to set off the alarm. The plants are dying.” I could hear from her voice that she was on the verge of tears, and she was venting it as frustration. “What took you so long?”
“I was on the other side of town,” I lied. “On a job.” I didn’t want to tell her the real reason. It had been maybe an hour since she’d sent me the message—had she been inside the grow house ever since, with the temperature like this? No wonder she’d stripped off. I didn’t think I’d be able to bear it more than a few minutes in here.
I hunkered down beside her. Every little movement was an effort: the heat was ferocious. It made it difficult to think, and the fact I was staring at her nearly-naked body made it even harder. Jesus, her breasts were right there, a foot from my face, the dark shadow of her nipples visible through the soaked fabric of her bra—
I dug my nails into my palms and forced my eyes away. “Can’t we—”
“Call an engineer?” she snapped. “Look around you.”
“Shit. I could open the doors.”
I still couldn’t see her face, but I saw the tips of her hair toss as she shook her head. “The smell.”
She was right. The charcoal filters worked for the air vented through the air conditioning system, but if we opened the doors then big clouds of marijuana-scented air were going to waft right down the street. And I wasn’t even sure it would do much good—there was barely any breeze outside to move the air. We needed air conditioning.
“Do you...know what you’re doing?” I asked.
“No!” she snapped. But I heard that edge in her voice again, the fracture that was seconds away from cracking open and spilling tears. “I’m figuring it out as I go along, but at least I’m doing something, not just standing there—”
I heard her take two big gulps of air, almost sobs. Everything we’d worked for was about to be wiped out. I laid a gentle hand on her ankle and her body tensed....and then relaxed a little.
“It’s okay,” I said. “We’ll fix this.”
Another two long gulps of air. Then I saw her hair move as she nodded.
“I’m going to come in there with you,” I said.
“There’s not a lot of room.”
“Do you want help or not?” The heat was slowly cooking my brain. I was getting frustrated already and I’d only been here a few minutes. She’d been here...what, an hour? No wonder she was losing it. And every time I glanced down at her nearly-naked body, I came close to losing control in a whole other way.
I peeled my tank top over my head and dropped it on the floor.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Taking off my clothes, what do you think? I’m dying in here.” I pulled off my jeans and then, in just my jockey shorts, lay down beside her. To get my head inside the air conditioning unit next to hers, our bodies were going to have to be touching. I scooched closer and she jerked as my hip contacted hers. Jesus. I lay there propped up on my elbows, looking down the length of her gorgeous body, every pale curve glistening with sweat. And down between her thighs, where the thin fabric of her panties had soaked through, I could see the shadow of—
“Are you coming in?” she asked, her voice tight, “or not?”
I swallowed and lay down. Then I had to slide my body along the floor to slot in next to her. My leg slid against the side of her leg, hard against soft, both our bodies heated and slick. I could feel my cock swelling and rising. The nearness of her, the touch of her body like this, was driving me wild.
My head slid into the box and then, finally,
I could see her. We were side by side, like two lovers lying on their backs in bed, staring up at the ceiling. Except we were looking at tangle of multi-colored wires and, higher up, curving insulated pipes.
“It’s a wiring problem,” said Louise, her voice shaky.
I twisted my head to look at her. “How do you know that?”
She bit her lip. “I don’t. I’m just hoping for the best. If it’s anything other than wiring, we’re utterly screwed. A loose wire, maybe I can find and fix.”
She had a small flashlight in one hand and a screwdriver in the other and was poking determinedly through the nest of wires. I felt my chest grow tight. Goddamn it, even now she wasn’t giving up. This girl was amazing.
That’s why she deserves better than a thug like you, who’s going to get her killed.
“What can I do?” I asked.
She nodded towards my side of the box. “Trace the wires. See where they go. I haven’t done that side yet.”
I stared up into the rats nest of wires and started following them with my finger. We lay there barely moving, barely breathing, like a couple of lizards baking in the sun. Eventually, I said, “Are the plants okay? The ones those bastards broke?”
She glanced at me. “They look okay, don’t they?”
I nodded. When I’d come to the grow house each night to sleep, I’d seen the patched-up plants, their stems carefully wrapped in tape and they seemed to be doing fine. “But...y’know. You’re the expert,” I said. “And sometimes, you can’t tell by looking.” I held her gaze long enough to confirm that it wasn’t the plants I was talking about.
“They’ll be okay,” she said at last. Then she stared straight up into the wiring. “Now those guys are gone. And they’ll never come back?” She made it into a question.
I put a hand on her arm. “Damn right. Guaranteed.”
She nodded. “Then they’re okay.”
I nodded too and we went back to work. Knowing she was alright let me relax a little...but that made me even more aware of how close our bodies were. And thinking about the Serbians had only reminded me of how much I needed to protect her from my world. Half of me wanted to just dive on top of her; half of me wanted to run out of there before I could. But the only way I could help her was to stay exactly where I was, balancing on a knife edge.
“Here,” I said suddenly. “I think I feel something.”
“Where?”
“Here. I’ve got my finger on a wire and it feels...rough.”
“Rough?”
“Chewed.”
“Chewed?”
“Shine the torch on it,” I told her.
She tried, but there was no room. “Move out, let me move in,” she said.
“I won’t be able to find it again!” I was keeping my finger jammed against the suspect wire. “I only found it through blind luck!”
She took a deep breath...and suddenly lifted her body and slid herself atop me, her back to my chest. I caught my breath as her ass settled onto my groin. My heart was thumping like a pile driver in my chest. I could feel the tension in her body, too, both of us trying to hold back, to stay icy cold.
But it was so...damn...hot. There were so many reasons to stay away from her...but the feel of her against me was making them tissue paper in an inferno.
Louise shone the torch up into the wires. Her voice was strained. “Goddamnit, it is chewed,” she said. “A freaking raccoon or something’s been at it.” She reached out with her left hand for something, groping down by our legs. Every tiny movement made her ass grind against my rock-hard cock and I gritted my teeth, seconds from snapping and grabbing her. “Pass me the wire cutters!” she said urgently. “I can’t reach!”
I groped and found them. My head was spinning—the heat, the feel of her against me...holding back was the hardest thing I’d ever done. I passed the wire cutters up and—
My forearm brushed across her bra-clad breasts. Both of us froze, her nipples standing out like rocks against my arm. Her breathing fell into line with mine, becoming rapid pants.
It was just—
—too—
—much—
I grabbed her waist and twisted her, slippery as a mermaid pulled from the sea, so that she was facing me. And suddenly we were kissing, kissing like the only air in the world came from each other’s lungs, kissing like we hadn’t seen each other for a thousand years. I’ve never, ever kissed with such raw desperation. We couldn’t move or use our hands—they were all holding tools and wires. It was just our mouths: kissing, gasping, panting and kissing again in great hungry gulps.
When we finally broke, we stared at each other. Every muscle in my body had gone rigid with tension and, for the first time, there was no question of holding back or pulling away. A dam had burst inside each of us. All we had to do first was—
“Fix the fuckin’ air conditioning!” I croaked.
She twisted so that her back was to my chest again, grabbed the wire cutters and stripped and twisted the wires. Then she poked with a screwdriver and—
“Fuck!” Yellow sparks showered down on us and—
There was a slow whine that grew into a deafening roar. I felt wind against my toes and heard Louise’s lungs fill in elation. I pushed out of the air conditioning box, taking her along with me and—
It was as if we were lying on a sun-drenched mountain ledge, with the crest of the mountain just above us. Our bodies baked but we could feel the edge of the current of air as it whipped past. I lifted an arm and it was like trailing my hand beside a boat in the cool, clean water. Louise slowly sat up, her ass grinding against my cock. She slowed down as she came up towards sitting, savoring the moment...then gasped, arching her gleaming back as the air hit it.
I stared at that sensual, elegant arch, bisected by her bra strap, and I couldn’t take it any longer. I had to have her...now.
I reached up and unclipped the clasp: Louise drew in a big lungful of chill air as she felt her bra go loose. Then my hands were closing on her waist and I was lifting her, turning her to face me and setting her down again. She gave a long, shuddering breath as her soaking panties and the softness beneath them kissed the hard bulge at my groin. Her chest was heaving, her nipples standing out through the half-off bra. I scooped it off her shoulders and she let it trail down her pale arms. Her eyes never left mine for a second.
She sat there atop me, creamy body glistening, nipples hard and getting harder in the flow of cold air. Every freezing lungful of air she took in made her rock minutely against my cock. Her copper-colored hair hung down her back and spilled over her shoulders in gleaming waves. She’d never looked more beautiful.
I sat up, bringing our faces together. The tips of her breasts kissed my chest and we both tensed at the sensation. I could feel the blood pounding in my ears and I knew it must be the same for her: we were both being carried on a wave, now, out of control.
Just as I leaned forward to kiss her, I felt her fingertips against my lips. “Wait,” she croaked.
Wait? I couldn’t wait. I was completely and utterly insane for this girl. I put my hands on her hips, feeling the firm warmth of her, reassuring my brain that this was real, that I had her in my hands at last. Seven seconds. I could wait maybe seven seconds. “What?” I grated.
Her voice was barely more than a whisper. “Don’t stop again. Don’t push me away again. Not this time.” She shook her head, her red hair tossing. “I couldn’t take it. Okay?”
I already knew. Sometime in that cramped, steel box, the pressure that had been building up for months had finally gotten too much. It had exploded and shattered every reason I had for staying away from her: the ones that were to protect her and the ones that were to protect myself. It wasn’t a decision, anymore, it was a simple necessity. I needed her like I needed to breathe.
“Fuckin’ right,” I said with feeling. And kissed her so fast she barely had time to move her fingers out of the way.
Louise
It wasn’t like an
y of the kisses we’d shared before. This was as new and fresh as the cold air rushing around us, everything I’d imagined it could be but cleaned of all the problems that had been holding us back. His lips twisted and sought and I opened, sighing into his mouth as his tongue found mine. His hands swept up my body, all the way from my hips to my neck. Then they buried themselves in my hair, sliding through the strands and stroking the nape of my neck in a way that made me gasp and arch my back.
My breasts crushed against his chest—God, just as hard and hugely broad as I’d imagined it. We were both still so hot that every contact of our bodies—every scrape of my nipples against his iron pecs, every brush of his rippled abs against my stomach—sent ripples of fire through me, soaking down to my groin. I’d tilted my head up to meet his kiss because, even with me sitting atop him, he was still taller than me. So I was panting up into his mouth when he twisted his hands, fingers pointing down my spine, and slid them all the way down the arch of my back to my ass. A long, glorious river of pleasure, like liquid gold flowing down my body, and I arched like a cat. Then his palms cupped my ass cheeks and squeezed, fingers digging in just a little roughly, and the pleasure turned darker, hotter—
He broke the kiss and drew back a little. My stomach lurched. Oh shit…no, no, no, don’t stop! “What’s wrong?” I asked, my voice weak.
He was staring down at me with raw, unbridled lust, those cobalt-blue eyes flaring like I’d never seen them. “Not a bloody thing,” he growled. “Just lookin’ at you.”
He’d looked at me that way plenty of times and it had made me squirm every single time. But I’d never been straddling him before. Now, as his gaze licked down my body, it made me subtly twist and flex against the hard bulge beneath his jockey shorts. I felt him tense at the feeling and I laid my palms on his pecs to feel him better. Immediately, I went weak: the size of him, the sheer power of him, heart booming so hard I could feel my hand trembling, every muscle primed and ready. I looked down at the point where our nearly-naked bodies were pressed together, his tanned hips between my pale ones, and caught my breath. The two of us were bound together in a feedback loop: the more he looked at me, the more I moved; the more I moved and ground against him, the more his eyes narrowed in lust.
Growing and Kissing Page 15
