The Heat

by Alice Ward

  I didn’t know exactly what to expect, but what I got was a nod. “It’s your company now, son. I didn’t spend all these years showing you the ropes for nothing. If I didn’t trust you would do what you thought was best for the company, I’d never have let you take the reins.” He reached over and ruffled my hair like I was twelve again. “It’s good to have you back.”

  “It’s good to be back. It was a close thing.”

  His face grew serious. “I know. From the minute we heard you’d gone missing, your mother and I have been sick. We flew down here immediately and have been giving everyone hell ever since.”

  I grinned but stopped when it pulled on the sore still on my lip. “I bet you did.” I cleared my throat. “And Dad…?”

  “Yes, son.”

  “I’m never going anywhere without planning it out fully again.”

  He laughed. “Understood. And I promise not to give you hell for it.”

  Behind him, the door cracked open and light from the hallway spilled into the dim room. It opened farther and Atlee’s head came around the corner. She smiled the moment she saw me, pushed it open fully and stepped inside.

  My mother followed, her lips pressed together. “I tried to get her to rest but that girl has a mind of her own.”

  I grinned at Atlee. “Don’t I know it.”

  I took Atlee’s hand and accepted the kiss Mom planted on my cheek. When I looked at Dad again, seeing how tired he looked, I urged my mother to take him back to the hotel and force him to rest.

  She snorted, which wasn’t a sound she made very often. “Maybe I’ll have better luck with this one.”

  I expected my dad to argue, but he just clamped a hand on my thigh again and allowed himself to be led away after we all said goodnight.

  Damn, it was good to see them.

  “Your parents have been so nice to me. They’re really great,” she said, biting on her scabbed lip and shifting awkwardly from side to side.

  I nodded. Knew that. So after everything we’d been through, she was going to get shy on me. “How are you?”

  “Um. Okay. I had to be on serious fluids the first few days, and I got treated for sun poisoning. But I’m okay.”

  “How many days has it been?”

  “Four.” She sighed. “I can’t wait to get home.”

  “Right. First-class all the way. Margaritas and burritos.”

  She smiled. “Yeah.”

  I motioned her closer. “Come here.”

  She stepped to the edge of the bed.

  I shook my head. “Closer. I have something to tell you.”

  She pointed at my midsection, referring to either the injury or the countless wires protruding from my body. “But your—”

  “Fuck all that,” I said to her, getting my voice back. “Get your vegan ass up here. You weren’t shy about getting in bed with me before.”

  Her eyes widened. “You remember that?”

  Wasn’t I supposed to? “Sure I remember that. I remember almost everything.”

  A smile played on her mouth. “Do you remember farting and blaming me?”

  I slapped a hand over my face. “No. That, I don’t remember.”

  She laughed, and it was the most beautiful sound in the world. “Well, I’ll get in bed with you if you promise not to fart again.” I gave her a no promises shrug, and she nudged aside a few wires and crawled in bed next to me. She laid her head gingerly on my shoulder.

  “That’s better.” I took her hand in mine, linking our fingers together. “I actually have three things to say to you.”

  I could feel her smile. “Just three?”

  “Shut up, I’m talking here.”

  She turned her face until her lips were pressed against my skin. I didn’t want to even think about how bad I smelled, but if she didn’t mind… oh well.

  “The first thing is that I’m proud as hell of you.”

  “For?” she murmured, tracing her thumb over the back of my hand.

  I kissed her sweet smelling hair. “What can I say? You’re a beast. A true ninja warrior.”

  She nodded thoughtfully, a small smile playing on her lips. “True. Two?”

  “I think both of us have some pretty awful tan lines from this experience. And I’ve decided that, should you choose to accept, I will make it my mission in life to make sure your hot little ass is appropriately protected from the elements from this moment forward.”

  “I appreciate that,” she said with a businesslike nod. “Three?”

  “This one is most important, so listen carefully, because I’ve never said it to another woman before, and I want to make sure I get it right.” I leaned into her and kissed her on the forehead. “I’m falling in love with you, Atlee Young. I know we still barely know each other, but I want us to know each other more. A lot more.”

  She lifted her head from my shoulder and gazed into my eyes.

  I waited for a response, but she didn’t say anything.

  “Well?” I asked her.

  “Well what?” she said with a sassy shrug. “I’ve only been telling you I loved you for the past five days. It’s about time you answered me.”

  Something weird and wonderful surged through my chest, and I laughed. “Good to see you haven’t lost that attitude.”

  “Never,” she said, a challenge in her eyes as she tilted her chin to kiss me. “I don’t lose.”

  EPILOGUE

  Atlee

  One year later…

  The day I left Malaysia, I thought I’d never go back there again. All of Asia was pretty much off-limits for me. Actually, I didn’t want to travel anywhere again, ever.

  All it took was a couple of puppy-dog eyes from the man I loved.

  Turns out, I was putty in his hands.

  He’d rented a villa at the Four Seasons Malaysia, which was right on the beach, telling me that if I didn’t want to, we didn’t have to leave the room at all. It had everything — three thousand square feet of space, our own secluded beach and pool with waterfall, outdoor rain shower, twenty-four-seven room service, and lots of privacy.

  The room was beautiful, but I wouldn’t have wanted to leave it, no matter what.

  I pressed my face into the fabric of the hammock to quiet the moaning that was surely going to annoy everyone else in the vicinity as he plunged into me.

  He’d gathered my hair and was pulling my head back, biting on my neck, riding me hard. So fucking hard. Thrusting in and out of me like an animal, recreating that first time in the jungle.

  I loved it.

  I groaned as he gripped my hip with one hand, pumping me hard and fast, reaching under me to squeeze my breast with the other. A second later, another orgasm hit me, even more explosive than the first one. It was cataclysmic, almost too much. I found myself shaking so hard I thought I might fall to pieces.

  I cried out when he withdrew, but a moment later, sighed as his tongue replaced his cock, thrusting inside me. I pressed back into his face, my fingers clutching at the hammock as he licked me top to bottom and back up again, his tongue circling the tight muscle of my anus.

  The heat.

  I was burning up, sweltering inside, but it wasn’t from the temperature.

  Him.

  Even on the coldest days, he heated me up. Burned me alive with his hot kisses. His lovemaking. His love.

  “I taste you in my dreams,” he said against me, the words vibrating on my clit. “I can’t get enough. Never enough.”

  Neither could I.

  Since our return to America after our harrowing trip, we rarely spent more than a day apart, even though I still officially lived in my little apartment.

  He licked me, a bold, decisive stroke with the flat of his tongue that opened me for him. I whimpered as he shifted and flicked his tongue against my clit.

  He did it again, and again, making me shudder. “Wyatt...”

  “That’s it,” he murmured against me, his voice thick with desire as he cupped my ass and spread me wider, h
is face more completely against me. “I want to eat you up. Devour you.”

  I wouldn’t complain, even if I’d been able to even speak. At that moment, all I seemed capable of were weak little moans and a few pitiful attempts at saying his name as he worked my clit, using teeth and tongue.

  When he pushed two fingers inside me, I wailed, pushing up onto my toes, causing the hammock to sway.

  He caught me, holding me still, stabbing his tongue into me over and over before stroking it over my clitoris until I was crying out.

  Tiny chills raced through me, and I scrabbled my hands onto the material of the hammock, desperate for something more secure to hold on to. But there was nothing but the ropes, and the orgasm was crashing toward me like a wave.

  It hit me hard and fast, and I surrendered to it, was drowned by it as I moaned my love for him.

  He seemed to be waiting for just that.

  Before I could take in a deep breath, he rose up over me, his hand running up my spine as the thick column of his cock pressed against my entrance. In one smooth thrust, he was inside me again, the hammock swaying with the movement.

  “So good…” He breathed the words out slowly, almost in reverence, the heat of his lips pressing into my back.

  I shuddered as my body stretched around him. It felt so intense as I felt every ridge, every vein.

  His mouth sought out the curve of my neck, and he bit me there, intensifying the sensations.

  When he was seated deeply inside me, I caught my breath, groaning as he began to withdraw. I cried out at the loss, but he was back an instant later, surging into me, using the hammock like a sex swing to pull me back toward him. Our bodies collided together.

  Heat coiled in my belly, then spread, consuming every part of me. My heart raced so hard, it felt like it might explode inside my chest, and I would have happily died right there had that been the case.

  As the orgasm loomed closer, Wyatt moved faster, his hands on my hips, rocking me back to meet him.

  “Atlee…” My name shuddered out of him in a harsh growl, but I was helpless to do more than hang on as he speared into me over and over.

  My body tightened with the oncoming orgasm, and he cursed. “That’s right. Give it to me.”

  I did. Screaming into my fist as I was rocked by the climax.

  His cock swelled in response, scraped over the bundle of nerves buried inside me, making the orgasm go on and on.

  He was right behind me. I felt him climax, his cock jerking just before the heat splashed into me, my name growling from his lips.

  Collapsing onto my back, neither of us could do anything but attempt to catch our breath.

  I laughed, a soft, gasping sound. “I stand corrected,” my voice came out breathless and strained, “you really can have sex in a hammock.”

  He pulled out of me and sat back on the other end, throwing his leg over the side. “Kind of makes that big king size bed inside seem like overkill, huh?”

  I nodded, reaching for the margarita on the floor underneath us. I took a sip of it and collapsed back in the hammock, flushed and happy.

  He rolled next to me, kissing my shoulder. “We’re going to be late.”

  I grinned. “Totally worth it.”

  He looked over at me. We were both fully clothed, but my panties were down around my knees, and my skirt was up around my hips. It seemed like every time we tried to go anywhere, we got… delayed. This time had started when we’d gone out on the patio and had a heated argument over whether it was possible to get nasty in the hammock.

  We bickered all the time, but we loved it because making up was so much fun.

  He reached over and set my skirt straight. “Definitely.”

  I pulled my panties off my legs, wadded them, and stuffed them into his pocket. I pushed him down into the hammock and threw a leg over him, straddling him. “Bring back memories?”

  He wrapped his arms around my waist, ran his hands under my tank top, stopping at the small of my back. “Yeah.”

  I ground down into his cock, feeling my entire body twitch to life again. He closed his eyes and let out a breath, kissing me on the throat. “Something tells me we are going to be very late,” he murmured.

  So far, we’d missed pretty much all our reservations, but this was one appointment that Wyatt wanted to make sure we kept. Some of the lands that we’d run into on our tour had been replanted, and he wanted to show me the progress. He also had a “surprise” for me, something he thought I’d really like.

  I was as excited as a little kid on Christmas about that. In the past year, he’d proven to me to be a man of many surprises, and his surprises didn’t disappoint. He’d arranged to be the first major sponsor of Atlee’s Angles, which was one of the springboards to bring other major players on board and had given me the capital to really continue my videos, which I now shot all over the world. He’d bought me a studio and all the equipment to be legit. And a month ago, he’d unveiled WE’s first line of completely natural, sustainable products, WE4LIFE.

  As for my videos, I was now up to over six million viewers. Our appearances on the Today Show and Good Morning America, to recount the tragedy and put a focus on the rain forest depletion and sex trade, had given me a huge boost. Then, I’d completed a video series about the whole ordeal that had won me an award from the WWF. From there, it had just snowballed.

  I was still living in my apartment in Greenwich Village with Emily, but it was nice to be able to afford the rent.

  Also, we had a puppy. Her name was Elvira, and she wasn’t actually a puppy but a nine-year-old rescue mutt. She loved Wyatt more than she loved me, and Wyatt was fond of her too, because he kept texting Emily to make sure she was being well-cared for.

  When we finally made ourselves presentable and got outside, Wyatt had a rental waiting for us. He’d learned his lesson and managed to rent a hybrid BMW SUV, which might not have been able to trek into the wilds of Malaysia, but he said would be good for where we were going. Wyatt had promised we wouldn’t be going anywhere too remote, because I wasn’t sure I could stomach the anxiety such an exploration would produce. It was only a two-hour ride to this plantation. I could deal with that, and if I couldn’t, I knew Wyatt would hold my hand the entire time.

  As we drove, he pointed out fields of new growth that the Malaysian government was now working to rescue from the plantations. Through the foliage, I saw a monkey swinging from the trees and pointed it out, excited.

  “What do you think?” he’d asked when we finished the tour.

  “It’s beautiful,” I’d said, squeezing his hand. “Even more incredible than I’d ever imagined.”

  He smiled, showing me his dimple. “Thank you. We’re only a few minutes away from the new housing development. The new general store has already been expanded, and I bought five extra acres for the community gardens. Will be interesting to see how everyone is getting along.”

  I smiled at the wonderfully generous man beside me.

  In addition to changing the way his company harvested the palm, he’d also changed the working conditions for his employees. His employees. That was one of the first things he’d changed once we’d returned to the States. He’d fired the subcontractors and put the employees on the payroll, giving them all a living wage. Then, on top of that, he’d hired a developer to create housing for those who needed it, which led to the building of a little community that offered most anything that his employees would need.

  It was adorable.

  Apartment buildings made of brick and bamboo took up much of the space, but there were also parks and children’s playgrounds in the secluded community. A general store as well as a hair salon, laundry facilities and more reminded me of a self-contained block I’d find in New York.

  “The school should be opened next month,” he told me as we drove by an almost completed building.

  Tears pricked my eyes as I watched Wyatt’s smiling profile. It had become my goal in life to make sure that smile never left
his face. Just as my smile seemed to never leave mine.

  The first few months had been rough on him as he’d been forced to deal with the fallout of clean slating his board of directors. But just looking around me right then, I knew what he’d gone through had been worth it. Better, Wyatt knew it was worth it.

  WE was now a company in which he could be proud to be at the helm.

  And I couldn’t be more proud to be at his side.

  As we turned back onto the road outside the community, he took my hand, raising it to his lips. “Can I show you your surprise now?”

  I pointed out the window. “That wasn’t it?”

  He shook his head, hitting the accelerator. Half an hour later, we pulled in front of a large, modern wooden building with a green metal roof that looked like a fancy log cabin. The parking lot was packed. I craned to read a sign that said, Selamat Datang – Welcome – Orangutan Rehabilitation Centre.

  I clapped my hands, practically bouncing in my seat. “Really? Orangutans. This is amazing!”

  “I thought you’d like it,” he began, but I was already climbing out of the car.

  I asked a billion questions as we went inside. “Are we going to see real orangutans? Will they give us a tour? Can I touch one or hold a baby, do you think?”

  He just smiled and said, “Yes,” to all my questions.

  We went inside, and I was surprised how busy it was, with families and businessmen and well-dressed tourists all milling about. They all looked at Wyatt and me as we came in, but I was used to that now. Our fame from all the television appearances had definitely died down, and we didn’t mind it, though every now and then someone did recognize us. Mostly, they looked because my boyfriend was hot as hell, and just commanded that kind of attention.

  It was clear he’d planned this well, because a slight Asian woman approached us as soon as we arrived. “Mr. Watts?” she asked, shaking his hand.

  “Please call me Wyatt,” he said. “Ms. Bemoe?”

  She nodded. “Siti.”

  “It’s an honor to meet you,” Wyatt gushed, shaking her hand harder. There had to have been a story there that I didn’t know. Was this woman famous?