by Liz Crowe
As if on autopilot, he took the space between the bathrooms and the covered patio in a few strides, jaw set, sensing that she—that Sam—needed him. Sure enough, she’d passed right out, likely clonking her head on the arm of one of the lounge chairs in the process. That kid he’d seen before already had the furniture shoved aside and was feeling for a pulse. As he watched, frozen in place once again, the kid put a rolled up towel under her neck, then accepted a tossed stethoscope.
He took a listen, then flipped the scope over his neck like a pro. It suddenly hit Wade that the kid must be Cal Morrison, the transfer he’d heard about from Kentucky. Wade smiled, realizing that Cal was his probie—the newbie who’d be hazed mercilessly by his crew, breaking him in as they’d all been.
When Sam’s eyes flickered open, Cal was up getting ice. Wade dropped to his knees next to her, pressing on her shoulder, forcing himself not to stare at the way her cleavage was exposed in the deep scoop of her tank top.
Be professional, you ass, he berated himself, even as his scalp tingled when she met his gaze. Her shockingly blue eyes narrowed at the sight of him. She blinked fast and tried to prop up on her elbows.
“Nope, stay still,” he insisted, his voice croaky and rookie-sounding. “We need to check that knot on your noggin first.”
As if just realizing it, she winced and touched the goose egg rising near her left temple. A dangerous, vulnerable place to impact, he knew. Cal re-appeared, Jax at his side, clutching a bag of ice. “Give it here,” Wade barked, holding out his hand. When the bag didn’t land immediately in his palm, he frowned at the kid. “You deaf?”
Cal handed it over, his eyes flickering from Wade down to the prone woman, then back to Wade again. “I got this, kid,” he growled, putting the ice against her rapidly swelling temple. “Stay still,” he said to Sam, using his best I’m-in-charge-here voice. The crowd that had gathered began to disperse, guided by Jax and Skye, toward the food tables.
Wade remained on his knees next to her, getting a whiff of light perfume and trying not to gather her in his arms.
What? Where the hell did that come from, he wondered as she took the bag from him and sat up after a few minutes of lying on the patio surface. He moved aside, propped his back against the outdoor couch she’d sat on with that kid for the past hour or two, and patted the stone surface next to him to indicate she needed to stay down a bit longer. She bit her lip, still holding the now-sweating bag to her head.
Wade had to clench his fists not to reach over and take that sweet-looking, plump lip between his teeth—wanting to own that, and everything about her, right then. He shook his head to clear it as she settled down on her butt, keeping a foot of air between them.
“Thanks,” she muttered, not looking at him.
“Sure,” he said, unable to conjure anything else. Struck one hundred percent dumb by the mere proximity of her, his body tingled, head to toe. His breathing felt out of his control. After a few more minutes sitting there in utter misery—wishing he could escape while at the same time wanting to put his arm around her, kiss the top of her head, have her burrow into his side and let him take care of her, he cleared his throat and grabbed the scope Cal had left on the couch behind them.
“Let me . . . um . . .” He stopped, horrified by the fact that his body’s reaction now included a significant boner. He shifted, hoping to hide it, but board shorts left nothing to the imagination. He saw her look down at his erection then avert her eyes, her face flushed and beautiful. “Yeah, so,” he said, putting the cool metal disc right above her left breast, moving it around, frowning and trying to look like he knew what the fuck he was doing.
He did, of course. That was the hell of it.
The curve of her breast brushed his hand, making him shake. He cleared his throat again and sat, letting his head drop back, trying to regain his composure.
“So, am I free to go or what?” Her voice was flat and cold in a way that went straight to his gut. When he looked at her again, she was glaring at him, ice bag now in her lap. They were close—too close—and hidden in the gloom of the patio cover.
Sounds of laughter, of food being consumed, of drinks being poured, all disappeared from his ears. The smells of chlorine, sunscreen, beer and barbecue all faded. With a shaking hand, he touched her bare shoulder. She flinched ever so slightly, which sent another strange surge of protective possessiveness across his addled brain. He moved his hand down her arm, cupped her elbow and pulled her closer. She was breathing heavy now, and the distinct, sharp smell of turned-on female slammed into him.
“I don’t like you,” she whispered, their lips mere centimeters apart.
“That makes two of us,” he said, barely able to control the tremor in his voice. He felt like a giant, horny, exposed nerve—nothing like anything he’d ever experienced in his relatively vast backlist of experiences, not even with his once-beloved wife.
A drop of sweat appeared at the juncture of her collar bones. He leaned forward and touched his tongue to it, closing his eyes at the raw sensation of need that swirled through him. She shivered. A soft, sexy sound emerged from her throat, something raw and earthy. It vibrated against his tongue as he let it trail its way up the long line of her neck, to her jaw, her cheek, and then, finally, her lips.
She kept them closed to him at first, but with one hand still cupping her elbow, his other arm tightened around her against the couch where they were leaning, he probed with his tongue and encouraged her to open to him, to let him in. When she did, it was with a groan and a full-body shiver. Her arms wrapped around his neck, her sweet tongue met his.
Wade felt himself go into a terrifying place then—a place where he actually allowed himself to experience this—tasting, smelling and feeling the woman in his arms without closing his mind to her. His MO in the past years was to flirt and seduce, to get a willing woman to his bed or couch, or floor, or wherever, then to fuck her to get off. Nothing more or less.
But he wanted everything about this woman. He wanted to own her, the noise she kept making, and that fucking awesome smell of her. He wanted to eat that for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for the rest of his life.
“Oh,” she said as he broke from her lips so he could move his hand to cup her breast. She grabbed it, but instead of shoving him away, she guided his hand up and under her skirt. He hesitated. She stiffened in his arms. “What? You don’t want to,” she said, taking his earlobe between her teeth. “I want you to, Wade. Hurry,” she insisted.
Who was he to disappoint? But something about this whole thing was wrong. He didn’t want a quickie from this woman.
With a grunt of surprise, and once she’d unlaced his shorts and freed his aching cock to the cool air, he slid his fingers up the inside of her thigh, finding his target and shoving her soaking wet panties aside. Her warm, wet flesh rose under his experienced strokes. She let go of his dick and clutched at his arm, her whispered exhalations getting faster as her hips moved, thrusting into his hand.
Wade closed his eyes and bent to her lips, wanting to taste her when she came. And she did, with a soft moan onto his lips as her fingertips dug into his biceps. Her incredible odor intensified, filling his brain like much addictive smoke. He held onto her, his dick out and leaking all over the place in anticipation until she calmed.
When she put her head on his shoulder, Wade felt as close to weeping as he ever had in his life.
He sighed, and sat back, arm still draped over her shoulders, her face pressed against his neck, his cock rigid and exposed. Head swimming with unfamiliar, unwelcome thoughts, Wade attempted to detach in his usual manner, to stiff-arm any kind of emotion, knowing himself too well, how tempted he would be to lose himself, heart and soul along with his body.
In one quick movement, Sam shifted so her thighs were on either side of his, her luscious tits at his eye level, one arm beside his head, braced against the seat of the couch. He sat there as she stared at him, using her other hand to guide him inside her warm, welcomin
g pussy.
He hissed and gripped her hips, shaking his head, not wanting it here like this. Like the quick and dirty he always favored. But damn him to hell and back, she felt like velvet surrounding him, enveloping him, gripping his dick so tight he had to drop his head back and cover his mouth with his hand to stifle the groan of pleasure. She smiled down at him, her eyes bright, her face flushed.
He reached up to loosen her long hair and twined his fingers in it as it spilled down over her shoulders in a silky black waterfall. They locked eyes as she moved and he sat, still as a stone, letting her clench and release him, sliding up and down so slow it made him want to scream. But he didn’t. He just watched her face, feeling her juices coat him, sensing her tense in preparation for another orgasm.
“Come,” he growled, leaning up burying his face in between her breasts, knowing he was going to explode in about five seconds, despite how badly he didn’t want to be doing this right here, with their friends eating barbecue under the pavilion two hundred yards away. She dug her fingertips into his shoulders and ground down, making that irresistible low sound as her pussy pulsed and contracted.
“Oh, my God.” She sighed as her hips kept moving. Wade closed his eyes, sucked in a deep breath of her warm flesh and released his tight hold on himself with a muffled cry.
They sat, connected, breathing heavy, sweat and sex smells mingling pleasantly in his nose. He sighed and leaned back again, brushing a strand of her hair off her face.
“Wow,” he said, trying to find some sort of tender words to express how he felt. “Shit.” He winced, knowing that surely wasn’t it.
She released him, making him gasp and reach for her.
“Wait, Sam,” he said, woozy and wobbly, useless in the aftermath of such powerful emotions on the heels of the earth shattering orgasm.
But Sam wouldn’t meet his eyes and tugged her arm out of his grip so she could pull her skirt down. He saw how hard she was shaking. He could practically taste her anxiety on the back of his tongue.
“Honey,” he whispered, the word sounding odd in his mouth. He hadn’t used it in years.
“Don’t call me that,” she hissed, grabbing a cocktail napkin and wiping it between her legs before balling it in her fist. She poked her head up over the couch then shook her head. Wade just sat, still useless, still wanting her to sit down and talk to him, never to leave him. “Damn,” she said, sitting on the couch, her smooth calves at his eye level. He slid his hand between them, gripping one and leaning against her knee. “Get off me,” she said, as she got to her feet.
“Yo, Wade,” a voice called out too close for comfort. “Where’d you go?” With a curse, he laced up his shorts more or less the right way. He put shaking fingers to his nose, then between his lips, still tasting her.
Sam cursed and got down on her hands and knees. “Don’t follow me,” she whispered, her blue eyes bright again. “I mean it, Wade.”
He got up onto the couch seat, then to his feet, swaying and dizzy. “Wait, Sam, hold up. Let’s go . . . uh . . . eat and then . . .”
She made it out to the brightly lit pool area and stood, tugging her hair up again. Wade hesitated in the shade of the patio.
Let her go, his inner asshole told him. You got what you wanted from her. No biggie. Go eat some barbecue, have more beer, and take a nap or something.
He gripped the back of a chair.
“Wade, seriously. Where—oh, there you are. Where’s Sam?”
He kept his back to his friend and saw Sam put her finger to her lips, and then she scurried down the steps and ran for the line of cars. With a long sigh, he turned and faced Jax. “She wanted to go home,” he said, knowing his voice sounded weird.
Jax narrowed his gaze, then looked up when her Porsche SUV tore ass down his dirt drive. “What did you do to her?” he asked, taking a few steps forward.
Wade moved back, arms up, skin now ice cold and pebbled with goose bumps. “Nothing she didn’t want me to.” His inner asshole had hold of him now, he figured. “Back off, dude. You’re not her daddy.”
Jax sighed and crossed his arms. The two men glared at each other a few seconds until Skye hollered for them both.
Chapter Six
Sam managed to make it all the way down Jax and Skye’s long drive to the road, then almost a full mile before she had to pull over or risk causing an accident. Hands shaking and teeth chattering, she put the car in park then gripped the wheel, staring out the windshield into the hot Texas, start-of-summer day.
So innocuous, this day. Begun with such simple promise—a nice meal and a party with her friends. The type of party where she typically managed to pick up a new client or two, thanks to the way her reputation as one of Dallas’ top realtors preceded her.
Instead, however, she’d gotten drunk on margaritas, fainted, hit her head on a piece of furniture, and then proceeded to fuck the man who’d help revive her. Wade ‘Man Whore’Roberts himself. She, Samantha Jean Weaver, a woman who’d not had sex in damn near five years, had acted like the worst kind of hard-up, desperate slut, climbing up on the man’s lap and just going at it like a . . . a . . .
“Shit,” she muttered, balling her hands into fists. “Shit!” she yelled into the car’s warming interior, pounding on the steering wheel until her hands hurt.
Hot tears rolled down her face as she threaded her fingers together in her lap, white knuckling herself to keep from screaming like a banshee. He’d only kissed her, for crying out loud. She didn’t have to go and jump the man.
But she had. And she’d do it again if she were presented with the same opportunity.
Oh, yes, she would, and to deny it to herself would be the worst kind of hypocrisy.
With a moan, she put her aching forehead against the wheel, willing herself backward in time so she could accept his kiss, pluck his hand off her breast, stand up and walk away from him.
But no, she wouldn’t do that. Because she’d never felt such a base need as she’d experienced a mere twenty minutes ago. She’d needed that man, and more than his lips and hands and fingers. She’d wanted him—his dick—inside her. Deep inside her.
So, she’d made that happen.
So what?
It was the twenty-first century after all. She was allowed to initiate sex.
She sucked in a ragged breath and swiped at her streaming eyes. It was fine. It was all right. It was A-okay. She was a grown woman, with normal, sexual urges, and she’d acted on them—granted, for the first time in a while.
And with the worst man possible. But the only man who’d even come close to making her feel so wanton, so needy, so womanly and attractive in her entire life. Tommy had not counted. She knew that now.
“Fuck it,” she spat into the car’s now broiling interior. She cranked the a/c on full blast, letting the ice-cold air blow into her face, stirring the strands of hair that had escaped her tie-back. “Oh, dear God.” She sighed, putting a hand to her cooling neck. “Wade.”
She shuddered, and not because she was cold. Jaw set, she put the car back in gear and squealed out into the street. Body sated, mind awhirl, thighs still shaking, and skin on fire with the need for more from Wade Roberts.
Chapter Seven
The next evening, at six o’clock sharp, she pulled back around in front of Wade’s massive house, heart calm, pulse steady, determined to do this thing—the one thing she did know how to do.
Sign the contract. List the house. Sell the house. Happy client. The end.
Without allowing herself the luxury of panic or indecision, she got out, tugged her linen skirt down, and tossed her hair off her shoulders. She noted the massive truck she’d parked behind at the party yesterday in front of one of the three garage doors. The late afternoon was oppressive, weighing heavy on her chest, making it harder and harder to breathe.
Yeah, blame it on the weather, Sam. Jesus. Stop it. He’s just a man. A man you fucked and walked away from, and hip-hip-hurray for you for doing that. For breaking your dro
ught and in a relatively spectacular fashion. Rest assured that it barely registered with him. He probably does shit like that every day.
Sh marched herself across the paving stone path and up to the double, dark walnut doors with fancy inlaid glass. For the second time in her life, she rang Wade Roberts’s doorbell. She waited, then rang again. With a sigh, she did it one more time, then cursed and started back to her car.
He’d invited her. She’d shown up. He’d blown her off again. If she had any doubts about how much he’d been impacted by their hookup at the party, this put those to rest. “Fucking Roberts,” she said, yanking open the SUV door.
“Hey, uh, Sam?” She closed her eyes at the sound of his low voice. “Sorry. I was in the shower. Come on back.”
She sighed and slammed the door, then marched up to him. Wade stood in his open doorway, dressed in nothing but a towel. Water dripped down his neck and bare chest. She blinked at the six-pack perfection of his abs, at the remembered—okay, memorized—musculature of his arms. “My eyes are up here,” he said. She tore her gaze from the towel and glared at him. His deep, chocolate-brown eyes shone. His full lips turned up in a smirk. Anger buzzed through her brain.
“You know, I’d sure be interested to know what you look like with clothes on,” she said, crossing her arms and leaning away from him. Her throat was closing up, but she couldn’t let him know that. She swallowed hard. “Considering we’ve yet to encounter each other with you wearing much more than that.” She jerked her chin, indicating the towel he had gripped in one fist.
The smirk morphed into a real grin. Unable to stop herself, she mirrored it, then looked away when she sensed her neck, face, and ears heating up, giving away her inner turmoil.
“Yeah, you’re right.” His drawl wasn’t thick, betraying him as a non-native. “Come on in. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to keep you waiting.”
She peeked in, looking left and right. “No company this time?”
