Blooming in the Wild

by Cathryn Cade

  He pushed her sleeping bag down, his palm sliding hot and slow down across her shoulder and back up to settle over her breast, scantily covered by her light tank. Still devouring her mouth with his, he palmed her breast, cupping it and then squeezing her nipple gently between the edge of his thumb and forefinger.

  Bella moaned into his mouth, arching up against him as sensation shot through her, sweet and yet painful, arrowing straight down to her pussy.

  Joel lifted his head, his hand still busy. “Shh-sh, quiet, baby.”

  Bella wanted to bite him. She wanted him to bite her, or at least use that mouth on her, all over. But they were surrounded by others and although the rain and surf were loud, she wasn’t about to have sex here. Darn him for having tempted her this far.

  “Let me go,” she hissed.

  He groaned silently, his chest vibrating against her through her sleeping bag. Or maybe he was laughing. “Okay. As soon as you let go of me.”

  Which was when Bella realized she was hanging on to him like a vine, her arms around his neck, her fingers digging into the firm silk of his back, feeling the muscles flex beneath his skin.

  She pulled her arms back, her cheeks hot.

  “We could take this outside,” he offered softly, his hand still on her breast. He pinched her beaded nipple, and she grabbed his thick wrist, wanting to hold him there but pushing him away instead.

  “No way. Frank is right by the entrance.”

  He sighed. “All right. Wanna come over here and snuggle instead?”

  She rolled her eyes at the grin in his voice. “No. I’d have to use that move on you.”

  “Oh, I think you already did, baby.”

  And just like that, he was gone, dropping back onto his own bedroll, and leaving her there, alone and wanting. And she suspected he knew it all too well, damn his arrogant hide.

  Chapter Ten

  To Do: In the event of an accident, the tour director works smoothly with those in authority.

  Joel was having a really great dream—the best of his entire life. He knew it was a dream, but he went with it, enjoying it for what it was…tropical bliss.

  He lay in a soft bed of leaves and flowers on the bank of the grotto pool, naked. Her shoulders back, head high, Bella paced toward him like a young queen. Her crown was red hyacinth, a lei of creamy yellow plumeria hung around her neck, and her breasts were bare, as was her torso and her slender waist, the flat plain of her belly. She wore only a tiny kapa-cloth skirt around her lush hips, baring most of her strong, curving legs.

  She stopped beside the bed he had made for them, surveying him as if deciding whether he was what she wanted. But he knew he could make her want him—knew it as surely as he knew that if he didn’t have her here, now, he would go crazy, wild with rage and desire.

  Smiling up at her, he held out his hand to her.

  “Come to me, Princess.”

  She cocked her head, those ebony eyes heavy with desire and a teasing light. Her soft mouth curved up in a mysterious little smile. “Malia paha. Maybe.”

  He palmed his turgid cock, enjoying the pull of his hand on the exquisitely sensitive shaft, watching her watch him. “This is yours. All for your pleasure. Let me fill you, make you feel the way you deserve.”

  With a sigh of surrender, she pulled the tie of her skirt, and it slipped to the ground around her feet, leaving her bared to him. He groaned aloud at the sight of the sweet little triangle of black curls at the apex of her thighs. “Ah, Princess. No ka oi, ka nani.”

  Sitting up, he took her hands and brought her down into his arms.

  She rolled away from him, onto her side, and he moved behind her, spooning his body tightly to hers, wrapping one arm over her waist to slide his hand down and cup her sweet mons and driving his cock into the crevice of her lush ass. She was all silk and heat in his arms, the perfect package of feminine dynamite, primed to blow and take him with her.

  Joel woke with a start, his eyes flying open. For a short, charged moment, he lay there in the darkness of the cave, unable to separate the dream from reality.

  He held Bella in his arms, just as in the dream. Warm and lissome and alive. He was spooned around her, had his cock in the crevice of her ass, her sweet mons filling his hand. He could feel the heat of her pussy through her thin cotton boxers, and his fingers were damp with her arousal, which had soaked her little shorts.

  She moved sinuously in his grasp, a soft whimper of need and want in her throat, and he realized that she was still asleep, and as turned-on as he was. Joel groaned silently. If he were the gentleman his mother had raised him to be, and the one Frank had reminded him he’d damn well better be, he’d get the hell back onto his own sleeping bag. But he couldn’t make himself let go of her—not when she was primed and ready and his own balls were so tight they ached, his cock quivering with the absolute need to get inside her.

  Closing his eyes, he moved his hand, enjoying the feel of her in his palm, the satiny heat of her thighs clenching around his hand as he stroked her through the thin shorts. She made that little whimpering sound in her throat again, and he reached farther, finding the edge of her knit boxers and thrusting his fingers underneath.

  “Bella,” he whispered urgently, rubbing his face on the rumpled satin of her hair. His whiskers caught in the strands. “Baby, wake up.”

  Heat roared through him as his fingertips found the slick, swollen petals of her labia. Rigid with desire, unreasoning now, he thrust his longest finger slowly, slowly into the tight sleekness of her pussy.

  She gasped, and her arm fumbled over his. He froze, thinking she wanted to push him away, but then realized she was awake, and pushing at her little shorts. Oh, hell yeah. She was as primed as he was by that kiss.

  Easing his fingers out of her, he grasped her waistband, pulling the shorts down over her ass and letting her push them farther, then pedal her legs to kick them off. Ah, all that firm, luscious roundness in his lap. He gave her a quick fondle, and then thrust his hand back where they both wanted it.

  Her delicate, springy curls filled his palm, and the slick heat beneath welcomed him in, her pelvis tilting up to make it easier for him to slide one, then two fingers deep into her tight little channel.

  She made that sound in her throat again, and he played her, sliding his fingers in and out, making her quiver and buck in his grasp.

  Joel felt the exact moment when she really woke. The soft hiccup of shock, and the sudden stilling of her sinuous movements. Ah, hell, was she going to think he’d been molesting her?

  “It’s all right, Princess,” he soothed, just loud enough for her to hear him over the surf. “Just let yourself go. I’ve got you.”

  She was still for a moment, and then, oh glory, yes, he felt her small hand cover his and press, urging him on. He lifted his head far enough to press a kiss to her bare shoulder, and then he hooked his fingers inside her pussy, pressing them up against the spongy pad of her g-spot, and swirled his thumb over the slick little knot of flesh hiding in her curls.

  She sucked in a long, shaken breath, and he felt her begin to quake around his hand.

  “Shh-shh,” he breathed. “Not a sound, baby. Come real quiet.”

  His voice seemed to send her over the edge, and she bucked in his arms, her breath shuddering in and out, her pussy squeezing his fingers rhythmically as she orgasmed. Ah, so sweet, and damn near as good as coming himself.

  But not quite. If he didn’t get to soon, he was a dead man.

  He held her until she relaxed against him, and then he let her go, just long enough to yank his own shorts down and free his cock. It slapped her on the ass, her satin skin a caress, a tease.

  Hooking his hand under her upper thigh, he lifted it enough to let his cock slide into the soft crevice between her thighs and then let her leg drop back, enclosing him in the furrow of her body.

  “Okay?” he gasped, his teeth clenched. He was about to blow, and even if he didn’t dare get inside her without a condom, godda
mn it, he had to at least have a touch of her.

  “Wait,” she whispered, turning her head. ”Are you—I mean, have you been tested?”

  “Yes. I’m clean, I swear,” he managed.

  For one agonizing moment, he waited. Then she moved, arching her back so that he slid along that wet, slick crevice.

  He filled his hand with her again and began to work her clitoris in a fast, hard cadence, caressing her and his cock, pretending it was deep inside her, instead of sliding back and forth in the almost, nearly, so-close torture of her labia.

  He hadn’t had to make do this way since high school. But with her, it was enough. And as release roared up through him, his come jetting in long, sweet pulses onto her thighs, he felt her tense and shudder again as well. Then both of them collapsed, wet with perspiration and his come.

  Joel buried his face in her hair, a tumbled silky swath under his cheek. Had he made any noise? He didn’t think so, but he was breathing as hard as if he’d been running a marathon, his heart pounding, bursting with the urge to laugh.

  “Ah, Princess,” he whispered when he could speak. “You are one naughty wahine.”

  She stiffened in his arms, just as he’d known she would, and grabbed his wrist, trying to yank his hand from between her thighs. He let her go, slowly, because she felt so damn good. Then, grinning like a fool, he sat up and pulled his T-shirt off over his head and gave it to her, patting her bare hip.

  Bella took the bundle of soft cotton Joel handed her and used it wipe the warm, sticky fluid of his semen from her thighs, belly, and then her sleeping bag. She touched the damp spot on her bag, left after she tossed the shirt aside, and then yawned, a huge, toe-curling yawn that consumed her just as her two orgasms had only moments before.

  Shock and pleasure and resentment tumbled inside her, warring with sheer cringing embarrassment. What had she done, and right in the cave with everyone else? And with him. What if someone had heard them? Heard her? Had she made a noise? And was she a total slut because knowing others were sleeping only feet away had been all twisted up in her incredible arousal and two orgasms?

  She wanted to blame it all on Joel, absolve herself of responsibility for her wanton behavior. That she couldn’t just pissed her off.

  “Can’t believe I let you do that,” she muttered as his arm brushed hers, his skin still hot and damp.

  Her body felt wonderful, still soft and pulsing with pleasure, her clitoris tender where he’d massaged it with his calloused thumb. And yet needy, somehow. Face it, she wanted much more than his fingers inside her.

  “Yeah, well, you can hate me in the morning. Go to sleep.”

  “Oh, right. There’s a wet spot on my sleeping bag.” She blushed in the darkness. This was the kind of conversation one had with a boyfriend, a lover, not a casual acquaintance on a camping trip. Although there hadn’t been anything casual about the feelings he stirred in her from the first moment they met.

  “All right, here.” He moved away and came back with another T-shirt, which he smoothed out on her bag, managing to get his hands on her several times while he did it.

  She shoved his hand away from her ass. “Mahalo, now go away.”

  “Can’t help it, Nani. You feel as pretty as you look.” But he moved away and lay back down on his own sleeping bag with a long sigh. “Night.”

  And that, she supposed, was that. Bella lay down, gazing sleepily into the night.

  The trees swayed quietly outside the cave, their leaves whispering as if they were laughing. Of course they approved of what she’d done. They wanted her to take it even further. They wanted…

  With the thought half finished, she fell asleep.

  The first thing she saw when she opened her eyes at dawn was Joel. He sat on his sleeping bag, wearing only a pair of shorts and looking out into the morning. He looked big and tough and dangerous, with his muscled arms locked loosely around his knees. In the morning light, she noticed that his arms and legs were lightly dusted with reddish hair, and he had an old scar above his near elbow, a streak of white across his smooth, tanned skin.

  She imagined slithering across the short space between them and nuzzling her face against the long line of his spine, following it up with a trail of kisses, inhaling his scent while she smoothed her palms over the broad curve of his back, learning those long muscles. Her hands clenched on her sleeping bag.

  As if he felt her gaze, he turned his head and looked down at her. His hair was flat on one side, his cheek creased from his pillow, and he had a morning beard shadow on his wide jaw. But he still looked good enough to eat, and his eyes were full of a look that made her insides melt and the modern woman in her bristle. It said very clearly—mine.

  One corner of his mouth kicked up. “Too late for second thoughts, Princess,” he murmured. “The deed’s been done.”

  Rebellion flared inside her. “Huh. Wasn’t much of a deed.”

  He raised a brow at her. “You came twice, so I’m not sure what you’re complaining about. And you know damn well the rest is gonna happen, sooner or later.”

  She sat up, tossing her hair back. “Malia paha, hotshot. Maybe—if I say it will.”

  His eyes narrowed. He braced his near hand on her bag and leaned toward her, close enough that her body reacted, swaying forward to meet him.

  A shadow fell across their faces. They jerked apart to see Frank standing in the mouth of the cave, the dawn gilding his outline. He wore shorts and a Tshirt, and a fearsome scowl on his face. He held up a finger for silence and beckoned sharply to them.

  Joel was off his bedroll in one smooth motion, gliding out into the morning after Frank. Her good mood dissipated like a popped bubble, Bella hastily grabbed her shorts from on top of her bag, stepped into them and yanked them up, the sibilant hiss of fabric loud in the quiet cave. One swift look around showed three still humps in the sleeping bags at the back of the cave. She grabbed her shoes and tiptoed out after the men, pushing her hair back out of her eyes.

  It was a lovely morning, the air washed clear by the storm, a few clouds of misty lavender and peach clustered high on the mountain, the sun already rimming their tops with gold. The sea was a sheet of calm silver, the surf a quiet wash of low tide.

  The two men stood a short distance away, past the fig trees.

  Frank gestured down at the shore. “Look at it,” he hissed. “Look at my boat.”

  Bella stepped past Joel, wincing as she stepped on a pebble. He caught her arm to steady her. “Oh, hell, Frank. What happened to her?”

  Premonition filled Bella. The catamaran was listing heavily to one side, and, instead of bobbing on the surface, washed dully in the surf, bumping against the sandy bottom.

  “Somebody wrecked my boat.” Frank’s jaw was so tight he gritted the words out, and he clenched his fists as if he could wrest vengeance out of the morning air. “Holes in two of the pontoons.”

  “Oh, Frank.” Bella pressed her hands to her face, horrified.

  Joel let out a long breath. “Holy hell. I’m sorry, man. So sorry.”

  His big hand closed on Bella’s shoulder and squeezed lightly. “Nani, go get our phones, would you? Mine’s in the outside pocket of my bag.”

  Of course they would have to call for help, for rescue. Their phones would be working now that the storm was past. Bella hurried back into the cave. She grabbed her phone, rummaged for Joel’s and tiptoed back outside.

  The men were already halfway down the shore toward the bay. She followed them across the strip of sandy beach, stopping at the water’s edge. She didn’t want to compound their problems by dropping phones in the water. Shoving Joel’s phone into her pocket, she opened hers and pressed the On button.

  Frank waded in thigh-deep and laid his hand on the curve of one gleaming white pontoon, as one would the flank of a horse. He pointed down with his other hand, indicating an ugly, splintered hole just under the water line. “Right here, and back there, and there.” He shook his head, his face set in tight, angr
y lines.

  “How’d they do it?” Joel asked, bending over to peer at the hole. He explored the edges of the hole with his fingertips.

  “Looks like bullet holes to me,” Frank said.

  “Someone shot holes in it? How could we not have heard that?” Joel demanded, shoving one hand through his hair.

  “Silencer. All we would have heard is the crack of the fiberglass hull, and with the storm—” Frank shrugged. “I probably heard it, thought it was ku‘i ka hekili, da roar of thunder.”

  “Can we make it back to Kailua Harbor with two pontoons?”

  “Dey shot up the middle one too.”

  “You have any patch material?”

  Frank shook his head. “You can’t patch up something like that, not in the water. Anyway, the pontoons are half full of water.”

  Joel turned to Bella. “You get a signal yet?”

  “Just a sec.” She peered at her phone. The small symbol at the top flickered, indicating that the phone was searching for a signal. She scowled at it, frustrated. She shook her head. “Nothing.”

  “Hell.” Joel splashed out of the water to take his phone from her. She and Frank waited, watching as he worked the buttons. After a moment, he shook his head, that hard look intensifying. “Nope. Nada.”

  Frank slapped his hand on the pontoon and then waded up out of the water. “Sorry to say it, but I think we are hip deep in ka'eka'e. We got no transportation, no way to call for help.”

  “You want me to hike up the mountain and see if I can find a road or a house?” Joel asked.

  Frank thought for a moment, then shook his head. “We’ve got bigger problems than no phone service, no boat.” He looked both of them in the eye. “Whoever did this, came outta da cave.”

  Bella gasped. “What? It was one of our group?”

  Joel grunted, looking down at the sand, still damp from the rain. “Of course. Hell, I should have thought—footprints.”