“Is it okay if Dad stays here another night or two?” Sam asked Sandi. “We’ll pay for the room.”
“Of course it is, and no you won’t,” Sandi said. “The room was vacant anyway, and I’m not taking money off you.”
“What about you,” George asked his son. “Where will you sleep?”
Everyone exchanged glances, Mac, Fred, and Sandi looking most amused.
“I’m staying at Ginger’s,” Sam said.
“Oh?” George looked puzzled. “I thought those cottages only had one bedroom.”
Ginger’s face burned. “It’s... ah... I thought I’d... um... I mean...”
“You could have just said I was sleeping on the sofa,” Sam pointed out wryly as they all started laughing.
She pressed her hands to her cheeks as George’s lips curved up. “You’re teasing me,” she scolded.
Sam held out a hand to her. “He knows how I feel about you. Come on.”
She rose and started to gather up the plates.
“I’ll do that,” Sandi said, smiling. “Go on.”
“Thank you,” Ginger mouthed, flashing them all a smile. She stopped and pressed a kiss to George’s cheek on the way past. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Take care of him,” George murmured. “The bakery runs as deep in his veins as it does in mine, even if he doesn’t realize it yet.”
“I will.” She waved goodbye to everyone and followed Sam outside.
The clear, cool air cut through her, making her shiver as she walked to the car. Once they were in, Sam put the heater on, filling the car with warmth as they headed down the hill.
“Sorry about that,” he said. “I wasn’t sure if you wanted anyone knowing about us. I’m sorry he put his foot in it.”
“I don’t mind.”
He took her hand. “You sure?”
“It’s not a secret, as far as I’m concerned.” She cleared her throat. “What did you mean when you said, ‘he knows how I feel about you’?”
“I told him on the first day I saw you that I’d met the girl of my dreams.”
She blinked a few times. “Really?”
“Oh, I’ve been crazy about you from the beginning, Ginger Cartwright. And I’m even more crazy about you now. For better or for worse.”
Was he aware those words were part of the marriage vows? Or did he just mean that he wasn’t sure whether it was a good thing that he liked her?
She didn’t comment on it, and neither did he, but his hand was tight on hers all the way to the town.
Chapter Seventeen
“I’m sorry that George was upset,” Ginger said as Sam pulled up outside her house. “That must have been hard, telling him.”
Sam turned off the engine and leaned back. “It’s going to be even worse when he sees it.” He’d been looking forward to going back with Ginger, but all his energy seemed to have vanished, and his spirits were low. He wasn’t sure he had the oomph for a night of passionate lovemaking. It wasn’t fair on her to mope around, drink whisky, pass out, and snore all night.
“You’re tired,” she said. “You’ve been working non-stop, and you’ve been cheerful and keeping everyone else buoyed up all day.”
Had he? It hadn’t felt like it. He’d shown concern for his neighbors and helped where he could, but that was just what decent people did.
“Something tells me you’re not used to having someone look after you,” she said softly. Her green eyes shone in the light from the nearby lamppost.
Someone looking after him? The notion puzzled him. His father had encouraged him from a young age to be independent. He certainly hadn’t mothered his sons. He was ‘old school’, and had encouraged Sam and Ian to get back up when they’d been knocked down, pin a smile on their faces, and start again, rather than burst into tears. And Alyssa hadn’t been the sort of partner to whom he’d talked about serious matters.
“Come on.” Ginger opened the car door and got out, so Sam followed her.
They went into her tiny cottage, and this time she was able to put the lights on. By now, he was bone tired, and he let her boss him around like a child. She poured them both a whisky and sat with him in the living room until he’d drunk it, talking all the while about nothing serious, letting him start to relax as he sat there just listening to her gentle voice.
Then she took his hand and let him into the bathroom, put the shower on hot, and virtually undressed him, because he was too tired to lift his arms above his head. She stripped too, and he looked at her body longingly, but when he reached out a hand to cup her breast, she pushed it away and said, “Not now,” and instead led him into the shower.
She turned him to stand under the hot spray, poured a little gel onto the puff, and began lathering him, washing his shoulders and his chest, then turning him to wash his back. He leaned on the glass and closed his eyes, feeling as if he should tell her to stop fussing, but the truth was that it was pleasant, to be cared for, to give up his worries for a while. He concentrated on the feel of the puff gliding over his skin, along with her hands, the sensation of being touched by another person, the comforting contact.
When she’d done, she switched off the shower, took him out, and dried him off, then directed him into the bedroom while she dried herself. He sat on the edge of the bed, thinking that he should make an effort to be sexy, and he would, he was just going to lie down for a few seconds while she finished in the bathroom.
He stretched out on the bed and pulled the duvet over himself, and closed his eyes.
HE AWOKE TO A MOREPORK hooting outside the window, the sound echoing through the inky darkness.
He blinked for a few times, disoriented—the window was on the wrong side of the bed, and something felt different. Oh, maybe that was the soft body pressed up against him.
Shit, he’d fallen asleep. How embarrassing. He sighed and lowered his arm around her, skimming it down her back. She deserved more than him. He shouldn’t have started this relationship, because he wasn’t yet sure what he was going to do, and Mac was right, he should get out before they grew too fond of each other. He should find himself a room at the hotel in town and stay there until his house was dry enough to live in.
But Ginger murmured and snuggled closer, her breasts against his ribcage, one knee hooked over his, while her hand rested on his chest. Her hair lay fanned out over his shoulder, trailing like a sheet of silk, cool on his skin.
Maybe he wouldn’t go just yet.
He continued to skate his fingers down her back, and made himself live in the moment. He wasn’t going to think about the future, not about his father, or what he should do about the bakery. He was only going to think about Ginger, and the way her body dipped in at the waist, then flared out again for her hips. Trailing his fingers down her side, he traced her shape, enjoying her figure, thinking how soft she was, her muscles so different to his own hard ones, her skin like satin, and smelling so good. He fanned his fingers over her bottom, then drew them back up over her hips and up her side, letting the tips skim over the edge of her breasts.
Mmm.
He lifted, moving her onto her back, and she stirred and murmured sleepily.
“Shhh,” he said, and kissed her collarbone, then her breast, over her tummy, and shifted between her legs. He pulled the duvet over his head and settled down to kiss up her thigh before lowering his mouth to the soft core of her.
“Aaahhh, Sam...” she whispered, and stretched out beneath him, tilting her hips up. He sighed and slid his tongue into her folds, teased them apart, and licked up to her clit, which he flicked with the tip of his tongue, causing her to cry out and squirm beneath him.
Oh, he could do this forever, spend an eternity with her here, in bed, taking her to the edge of pleasure, joining her there, and then tipping over and tumbling with her into an abyss of ecstasy again and again.
It was hot beneath the covers, but Sam enjoyed the warmth, reveling in the smell and taste of her, in the slick slide of his tongue agai
nst her skin, the way his fingers slipped easily inside her. She was close, he could feel it, and he slowed the movements of his tongue, not to tease her, but to draw out her pleasure so that her orgasm took her gradually, and they could both feel the clench of every tiny muscle as her body contracted in six or seven strong, exquisite pulses.
When she’d done, he rose and kissed up her belly, over her ribs to her breast, and teased her nipples with his tongue, making her groan and sink her hands into his hair.
“What are you doing to me?” she whispered as he kissed up her neck to her ear, and across to her mouth.
“Loving you,” he murmured back, and he captured her lips with a long, deep kiss.
“Yuck,” she said when he eventually pulled back and leaned across to get a condom.
“It’s not yuck. It’s whatever the opposite of yuck is.” He rolled on the condom, then twirled a finger in the air. “Turn over.”
She did so, settling on her front, resting her cheek on a pillow. He nudged her knees apart, guided the tip of his erection between her legs, and slid into her slowly. They both sighed at the different position, the depth at which he was able to penetrate.
“Mmm,” she said, widening her legs and lifting her hips. “That feels good.”
“You feel good.” Supporting himself on both hands, he thrust slowly, loving the sensation of plunging into her soft body. “Fuck.”
“Oh, Sam.”
“Tell me to stop if you want,” he said, not wanting to arouse memories of her previous partner.
“I don’t. Don’t stop.”
“All right.” He bent his head and kissed her ear, then her mouth when she turned to look at him.
“I love the way you make love to me,” she whispered, her eyes shining in the moonlight spilling across the bed.
“You make it easy.” He stroked one hand down her body, still supporting himself with the other. “You’re so beautiful. You’re such a woman, Ginger, so fucking gorgeous.”
She buried her face in the pillow. “Sam...”
“I keep telling myself I shouldn’t have started this,” he said, because in the dark, it felt as if there was no point in keeping secrets from each other. “But I can’t stop. Because I want you so bad.” Jesus, she felt good, so fucking hot and wet clamped around him, her body not wanting to let him go each time he pulled back, and welcoming him when he thrust forward.
“Oh... I’ve wanted you... since the first time... I saw you...” she whispered. Her eyes were shut, and her lips were parted with pleasure. Sam could have come just by looking at her.
“I’m glad we’re doing this.” He moved her hair away from her neck and kissed her there, where her neck met her shoulder, fastening his mouth and sucking a little, so that she tightened around him and groaned.
“Aaahhh, I’d have... suggested it much... earlier if I’d known... you were this good.”
“I’m nothing special,” he said, his heart going out to her because she thought his meager talents were something to shout about.
“You are,” she whispered, “because you care. You’re gentle... mmm... but passionate... it feels as if you really want me...”
He plunged in and out of her, amazed at her understatement. “I do, Ginger, oh jeez, I really fucking do.”
She gave a soft laugh and followed it with a moan. “Ohhh... I like feeling... how much... you want it. You’re so... hot.”
That made him chuckle, and he lowered down and rolled her so they were almost on their sides, with her back flush against his chest. “Then you’re volcanic. You going to come again for me, baby?”
“Mmm... maybe...”
He cupped her breasts and tugged her nipples gently. Fire was threading through him, heating his blood, making his heart thud, his head spin. “I want you to clench around me. I want you to think of nothing else but how I feel inside you, all the way up to the top.” He held her hips and felt himself stretching and filling her. “Fuck, that’s amazing.”
“Jesus, Sam...”
“Come on, you can take all of me.” Holding her tightly, he slid in and out, pleasure spiraling through him. “You don’t know how many nights I dreamed about this.”
“Really?” She lifted a hand back to cup his face, her thumb brushing his stubble.
“Yeah.”
“Did it turn you on?”
“Oh yeah. I’d picture you naked, in my arms, just like this...” He stroked his hands down her body, over her breast. “And I’d imagine how it would feel to be sliding into you.”
“Was I good?”
He laughed. “Always. But the reality is so much better.”
“I like to think about that,” she whispered. “About you lying in the dark, thinking about me, touching yourself...”
The little minx. He chuckled into her ear. “You do, do you?”
“Don’t tell me you didn’t. Don’t spoil the fantasy.”
So she liked a little dirty talk. Had her ex done any of that? Maybe not—maybe he’d concentrated on the physical stuff, forgetting that women were turned on first and foremost in the head. “Of course I did.” He brushed a hand down the soft skin of her underarm, over her breast, down her tummy. “I’d lay there in the dark, getting all hot and sticky as I stroked myself, thinking about your mouth on mine, of touching you, of having you touch me...”
“Mmm...” She was close, he thought, but hanging on, enjoying this erotic exploration. “I’d think about you while I touched myself.”
Oh Jesus, now he was seriously turned on, thinking of her slipping her fingers between her legs, arousing herself gently in the night. “You’ll have to show me,” he murmured, moving his hand down to do just that.
“Only if you do the same.”
“It’s a date.” He felt a swell of delight that she wanted to see him again after this, surprising himself.
“I never realized,” she said, arching her back to push her breasts into his hands.
“What?”
“How naughty you are.” She gave a deep, husky laugh, finally, he thought, letting go of her last inhibitions and self-consciousness.
“I’m not normally. You bring it out in me.” He wasn’t going to last much longer. “God, I’m going to come. You’re too fucking hot.”
“Oh, don’t stop,” she pleaded. “I’m so close.”
“I won’t.” He summoned every ounce of self-control he possessed and held on, circling his finger over her clit until he felt her shudder, and her breaths turned to gasps, and then he let go. It was the strongest climax he’d had for a long while, so blissful that he heard himself exclaiming, shouting something into the darkness, although he couldn’t have said what it was. Heat rushed through him, and he tightened his arms around her, locking them together in a paroxysm of pleasure for what seemed like hours, until their bodies finally released them.
“Jesus.” She collapsed back in his arms, breathing heavily. “That was amazing.”
“I feel faint. All the blood in my body is in my groin.”
She giggled, clenching around him, and he groaned and withdrew. He disposed of the condom, then came straight back and took her in his arms again.
“Mmm.” She yawned and nestled back against him. “So tired.”
He smoothed her hair off her face and kissed her temple. “Go back to sleep. I’m sorry I woke you.”
“Yes, you terrible man. I’m never going to forgive you.” Her words were slurring—she was dozing off.
He smiled in the darkness, his own eyelids drooping. “You can take the rest of your life to pay me back, if you like.”
But Ginger was asleep.
Sam’s smile faded, and he looked out of the window, at the stars twinkling in the midnight sky.
You want to leave, Mac had said. If that’s what you want, then do it soon... Before you both fall in love.
Unfortunately, he thought, he’d left it too late.
Chapter Eighteen
The next week provided a rollercoaster of emot
ions for Sam. During the day, he fought against depression and tiredness as he worked in the bakery, continuing to clear it, and dry it out. He met builders, carpenters, plumbers, decorators, and a hundred other people as he priced up repairs and renovations. He worked mainly alone, or with Piri, as Ginger had to work in the restaurant, but around six p.m. he met her at her cottage, and his mood drastically improved as they spent the evenings having dinner, talking about their day, bathing in the hot tub, and then indulging in luxurious lovemaking sessions.
At first, Sam tried to ensure he took things slowly, but he soon learned that pace wasn’t the issue with Ginger. What she wanted was a bit of sizzle, anything that didn’t involve just pressing her buttons in the right order, and that Sam could understand. She liked it when he got carried away, when his desire for her overwhelmed him. She loved it when he made her laugh, and she was thrilled that he enjoyed talking dirty as much as she did. The two of them did their best to shock each other, taking their passion to dizzying heights as they whispered in the dark of all the things they dreamed about doing to each other.
He knew it would only be another day or two before his house would be given the all-clear, and he would have to return there to be with his father. He wasn’t sure what was going to happen between him and Ginger then. They’d only been together for a week, and he didn’t think either of them was ready to move in together. He had enough to worry about with the bakery, so he decided he’d tackle the subject later.
Whenever he had a minute to himself in the day, though, he found his mind returning to Ginger. He couldn’t help it. She consumed him, lingering in his thoughts even when he was talking to other people or working. He’d flick through the images in his head from the night before, picturing her with her eyes closed in ecstasy, or looking up as she went down on him, her green eyes fixed on his, promising pleasure.
But it wasn’t just the physical side of things that kept her in his thoughts. He began to look forward to meeting her in the evenings so he could talk to someone about his day, and about his worries and concerns. She loved George, but she understood Sam’s feelings about his father. She was there when he first took George to see the damage, and she saw how upset he got at the sight of his beautiful, historic bakery in ruins. She no longer pressed Sam to make changes to the bakery, even though she obviously felt that now would be the perfect opportunity to change things, with all the renovations happening.
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