She squeezed in tighter, her body pressing against his. They created heat in addition to the way the air swirled around them, but he’d be damned if he cared. Some things were worth being too hot for. Her touch was absolutely one of them.
He sucked in a heavy breath when she squeezed him tight. “You’ll regret that when I can only fuck you for a half second.”
She giggled, burying her mouth against his pecs. “I doubt that. Your pride would be wounded if you didn’t make me come.”
Was that what she thought of him? That it was only a matter of pride? She was more than that. Her orgasms were about giving her something good. Not about making her a receptacle.
He held her firmly with one arm while he reached toward the pants he’d dropped to the floor. Without looking, he found a condom in a pocket. “Come sit in my lap and we’ll talk about my pride.”
“Is that what you call it?” Her hands worked deftly to slip the condom over his length, then she scrambled across him. He shifted back so that she had enough room to balance on her knees.
He helped that balancing act with a grip on her ribs. His thumbs stroked over and over the undercrease of her breasts, which made her give a breathy, soft moan before her pussy even touched him. He could measure how much she liked what he did to her breasts with every clench of her hand on his latex-covered cock. She liked best the way he took her wholly into his mouth. It was enough to make her squeeze as well as moan. He pressed the tight bud of her nipple against the top of his palate and rubbed over and over with his tongue.
Her thighs melted. She dipped, the heat of her pussy caressing his cock. He grunted at the contact. “Tell me, Annie. Tell me what you want.”
“I want to fuck you.”
He traced the tops of her breasts with his tongue, then pushed them together so he could go from nipple to nipple and back again. “Do you want to fuck me, or do you want me to fuck you?”
Her voice was breathy and shaky. “Is there a difference?”
Locking a hand around the back of her neck and holding her hip, he pulled her down over him. She was fucking tight, even though she was gorgeously wet. Her lips clung to him and her eyes went dark and hazy. Her mouth parted on tumbling, frantic breaths that turned into gasps and moans and breathy sounds. But he knew what she could do, the way she could scream for him.
He meant to hear that again.
“Move,” he ordered her.
She balanced her wrists on his shoulders, her hands lifted and fingers curled. Her hips moved slowly at first, but she soon fell into a rhythm that threatened to snatch Sean’s breath away. Her stomach tightened and released on every brain-shaking grind. She went shallow at first, only engulfing the head of his cock. Then lower and lower by increments, until she had wedged her pussy so far down that he could feel the wet kiss of her clit at his pelvis. He held her there, not letting her up again, and his fingers dug into her slender hips.
“There.” He let her up, but then pulled her hips back down again, this time fast, at the speed he chose. “At first it was you fucking me. Now this is me, fucking you.” He bared his teeth in an attempt to hold back the waves of pleasure.
He had a mission here, and he meant to make it happen. There was a tight balance between letting her have what she wanted and throwing all of himself over for her. He’d have her, not the other way around.
Except she didn’t just take it. He should have known better. She twisted until she’d come up free of his cock. A lick of breeze squeezed through the narrow inches between them, chilling the sweat across his flesh. She touched his jaw, two fingers across his lips. He was breathing too hard. Almost panting, rough and raspy.
He squeezed her waist, the back of her neck. “Where are you going?”
“What we do . . .” She took a deep breath, kissed him softly. Left her lips hovering millimeters from his, so that they traded air back and forth. They sustained each other and hovered in an in-between world where everything else went away. “There’s no winning. No one’s going to lose. If you fuck me or I fuck you . . . we both win.”
Shit. He didn’t want to love her. Didn’t want to feel like this, lighter than air and twisted tight in knots at the same time. But she was fucking magic. Unfair and unreal magic, because the illusion always went away.
At least when he was surfing he always knew the ocean wanted to eat him and drag him down to the depths. It was the ocean’s job to drown common men. And his job to float above it.
He had no job when it came to Annie. No place where he felt like he knew where he was going.
He kissed her. There were no words for her, nothing he could say in return. With softer, gentler hands, he nudged her hips down, twisting them around so that her shoulders lay flat against the cushions of the bench. He held both her ankles in one hand. “Bend your knees.”
“Sean?” Her voice was nervous, and her brows knit together with confusion and obvious worry.
She didn’t have anything to fear. He’d never hurt her or ask her for more than she could give. It would only push her away faster. He’d keep her near as long as he could. “You can do it, Annie. Make me happy. We’ll make each other feel good. You’re right.”
She gave a small nod, letting him bend her knees. From that angle, he could see the pretty pout of her pussy, her lower lips pressed together. Her flesh was slick and swollen. The tip of him barely fit there, but he thrust slowly to enter her. Luscious pink enveloped him inch by inch.
She gasped. Her hands found his where he held her thighs. “Oh, Sean. My God, you feel so big.”
“And you’re tight.” He held back his growls. It was everything he could do to keep his pace slow as he plumbed the tightness of her body. She was everything resisting and accepting. He rubbed her own wetness over his length and over her flesh. Around and around the small bit of flesh that made her moan and gasp and made her voice start working upward. She wasn’t screaming, not yet. But damn, she was close.
He loved this. Loved the way they were together. That was all it could be. Getting his heart caught up would only lead to problems. Heartbreak was the kind of thing that could cost a guy his career. He wanted both, Annie and wins in his tallies. But there was no way his luck would hold out that long, and not enough hard work in the world to get him both.
He wouldn’t let that matter for now. He had her, and he had what they made together. There was electricity in the way she moved. He fucked her deep, then deeper, until she snatched his upper arm and hauled him close. He was bending her in half, but she didn’t seem to care. Her nails sank into the back of his neck, and he welcomed the pain as proof of how much he affected her. Her mouth took his, even as he fucked her hard. She moaned. He kept fucking, except he was pretty sure that she was fucking him in return.
Because she wrenched from him the biggest, most uncontrollably explosive orgasm of his life. He hadn’t meant to come before her. It wasn’t what he did; it wasn’t how he worked. But she was tight and wet and responsive and so fucking greedy. He took it. Took her. The feelings rocked through him so violently, he had to bite the edge of his tongue to try to come down. To try to hold back stupid words.
He was able to keep thrusting a few strokes more, and, thank God, they were enough. Her eyes flashed wide. “Sean, there. I’m coming.”
She said his name again, then again. Pride and satisfaction made him suck in a hissing breath, as well as the way her body clenched down on his. The sun and sand were close enough to touch, and they’d carved out some section of the world for themselves.
This was paradise. For as long as it lasted.
Chapter 30
Saying that Cloudbreak was a heavy wave was like saying that a bird had wings. It was yeah, duh, bro territory. Annie sat cross-legged on a vinyl-upholstered bench of the resort boat used to take them the full mile offshore to the wave. Beneath the boat, fading out to the left, was the shallow reef that b
roke the ocean’s power to create Cloudbreak. The curl was a left break, coming straight at the boat’s anchor.
Annie’s stomach was tight. A hard little knot, as if she’d eaten something rotten. Her heartbeat thumped in her throat, where it didn’t belong. “You’re going out there.”
It wasn’t even a question. Of course Sean was. He was good at what he did. More than that, he was up there with the best of them. He paused in the act of streaking sunscreen over his upper arms and peered out at the wave. “Yeah. It’s kind of small, I know. But it’s worth trying out.”
She rolled her eyes and gave a slightly hysterical giggle. “That was kind of the opposite of what I meant. It’s fucking huge.”
“It’s only ten feet. Not that big. On a good day, Cloudbreak can double that.” He pulled on a white-and-blue rash guard, hiding the damp sheen of his already tanned skin.
“Ten feet on the back.” She was totally preaching to the choir, but she couldn’t help it. “That means twenty on the front.”
“It should make for some mean barrels.” He flashed a grin at her, but something in her face must have finally given away her worry. “Oh wait. You’re not okay.”
She swallowed against the sickly feeling in the top of her chest. Rubbing her knuckles over her sternum didn’t ease the burn. “Jesus, no wonder Mom asked if I was going to surf it. I mean, I’ve seen pictures of Cloudbreak, and I’ve seen video stream, but this is totally different.”
He sat down on the bench beside her. The arm he folded around her shoulders was warm, even under the pounding tropical sun. She’d practically dipped herself in sunscreen, and she’d reapply a hundred times before the end of the trip. It made their skin both slip together and sticky. “If you want to head in, the boat can run you back. You don’t have to watch.”
“But you have to do this.”
His jaw tightened, and she knew by the glint in his eyes that he was trying to hold back a smile. “It’s more than that.”
She sighed. “You love to do this.”
He held her close, and she could feel his nod against the top of her head. “It’s what I’ve been dying to get back to. Even six weeks out has been too much.”
“You’re good.”
“I’m the fucking best.”
She giggled, because there was only so much ego that she could take with a straight face. But it was more than being good. It was dedication. She’d seen his office and the work he put into the competition. He’d been doing it last night too. After mind-blowing sex on the porch, they’d made their way toward the heart of the resort for an incredibly slow dinner served by staff who seemed to be training Annie to go with the flow rather than actually serve her in a timely manner. When she’d asked Sean if the speed of their meal was usual, he’d just shrugged and said it was island time. So she’d gone with it.
But when they’d gotten back to their lush bure, Sean’s bags had been delivered post–customs inspection. He’d pulled out reams of printouts and his laptop, then consulted a tide chart for the best times for practice. He’d been on websites, aggregating information that she didn’t even understand the name of. All for something that seemed like intuition to her. If this was what pro-land was like, maybe it was better that she’d walked away. To her, surfing was feeling the water under her and trusting the board between her and the ocean.
Except maybe not when it was compared to a wave like this. Cloudbreak could snap necks. Period.
It could snap necks of the unprepared, maybe. Sean most certainly was not.
He rubbed her shoulder briskly to bring her back to the moment. “Your call. You don’t have to stay with me.”
She swallowed and took a long, deep breath. He wasn’t the only one who was good at his job. She’d been on her iPad and her computer last night and this morning, making sure things ran smoothly at home. “Make it good, yeah?”
“I’ll give you a killer show.” His mouth tasted like the freshly cracked coconut milk he’d been drinking moments ago. The kiss he gave her was swift, but no less powerful for the way he swept her over. Her lips clung to his, her fingers digging into his back, but she wanted to think that was just the kiss and just his mouth and what he could do to her.
Not doubt. She didn’t want to doubt him.
“I’ll be back before you know it.”
Then he was gone, diving off the side of the boat with his board. His legs were so strong, she wanted to wrap her own around him. The arch of his thighs said he could do wicked things with those legs.
“It’s hard to watch the first time, but then you’ll get used to it.” Gloria had been sitting in the bow, where there was a set of captain’s-style chairs set just before the driver’s portion. She had on a killer bikini that made Annie drool with envy. The floral pattern should have seemed too old-fashioned, plastic-covered-couch for words, but instead, Gloria’s curves filled it out in a way that would make a Playboy model proud. Her blond hair was completely casual, pulled back in a low ponytail at the nape of her neck, and she’d gone without makeup.
Annie remembered the dichotomous surfer look. She’d never managed it, instead defaulting to Speedo sports tops and honing her physicality until it meant she could cut killer rips. Her hair got skinned back into athletic ponytails. She didn’t think she could stomach regularly watching Sean surf. “I don’t know if I’ll come out again.”
“No?” Gloria shot Annie a sidelong glance. Maybe Annie was reading too much into it, but to her, it totally said amateur. “I always try to give Nate my full support. Hell, I did when Sean and I dated too. Some of the girls spend their time lounging on the beach, drinking fizzy things, but I always wonder what the point of that is. You could do the same thing back home.”
Annie froze a little bit. Gloria and Sean. Yeah, that made perfect, crystal sense all of a sudden, in a way it hadn’t before. The heartbeat that had been too fast minutes ago took a sluggish, ice-laden thump. “Ah. Yeah.”
Jesus, she didn’t want to get into the business of professional girlfriend. She had her own life. She couldn’t match up to chicks like Gloria anyway. A vacation was nice, yeah, but that didn’t mean she could sign off the rest of her commitments and do this full-time. She had a center to get up and running, and considering that she’d turned down Sean’s financing, she was going to have to return to her previous long-term plans, especially since the WavePro rep had yet to return her phone calls. Which meant returning to grant writing and shilling herself out at charity events.
Not sitting on the beach drinking fruity boozy things. No matter how good they had been the night before. “Anyway, it’s totally funny that we keep running into each other.”
“Not really,” Gloria replied. She had her gaze trained on the bobbing surfers. From this distance, they were mostly wet heads bobbing. At least they wore different-colored rash guards, which helped in telling them apart. “The guys always come out early. Get to know the waves. I was kind of surprised to see Sean. With everything that’s going on . . .” She dashed another sidelong glance at Annie. “I bet it’s been hard.”
“What do you mean?”
“I heard you got blitzed by the paparazzi.” Gloria’s eyes were wide with sympathy. “I’ve heard how creepy that can be. All those guys pressing in on you.” She gave an artificial shiver.
“It was a little annoying, but it was fine. I lived.”
The surfing community was so tiny. Annie hadn’t said anything to anyone at dinner last night, but they’d seen Kelly Slater and Mick Fanning at the bar when they’d passed by afterward. And then the Internet had been completely lit up this morning with photos and video of Sean leaving the airport. Word didn’t just get around; it flew.
That was yet another thing that Annie had been happy to leave behind when she left the surfing world. There wasn’t anything like that when you lived in Orange County but didn’t live in the insular world of pro sports. She�
��d been happy to keep secrets. Particularly of how things had ended for her. There was no reason for that to get around.
She hitched her elbows on the rail of the boat and watched the swell build. Sean was out there, in the lineup and ready to go soon. She could tell by his position in the water, the way he was angling his board and starting to paddle. The wave surged, picking him up.
Annie gasped and sat up straight. He stood on the wave’s lip, then his board dropped three feet off the edge. For a second, she thought he’d blown it. But he dug into the front. His knees loose, he cut into the wave as if he’d been born to do this. He pumped, bouncing with his full body weight to gain speed.
The wave swallowed him. The barrel curled over his head, minimal white at the lip. There was mostly smooth, blue perfection, and Sean owned it. He owned it.
Annie clapped, even though he couldn’t possibly have heard her. Her palms stung with it, and then she cupped her hands around her mouth and cheered. A couple of the resort employees hooted, giving their own happy energy to the moment. Even Gloria grinned.
“It’s so admirable, where he’s come from. How far he’s come.” Gloria gave an artful sigh. “Pity no one knows. He’d get a lot of fan support behind him.”
“Excuse me?” Annie hadn’t been around the pros for a while, but she sure as hell knew mental sabotage when she heard it. “Sean’s life isn’t something to be mined for fan attention.”
“No harm meant,” Gloria said, but her beautiful, perfect, orthodontist-endorsed smile didn’t go anywhere near her pretty blue eyes. “Nate’s mine, of course. He’s got my loyalty.”
“Doesn’t mean others should get you being a bitch, though.” Annie gave a perfect smile of her own. “But then, I get it. Nate’s nice, but that’s the problem, right? He’s lacking that cutting edge, the little oomph that gets him to the top.”
Gloria dropped all manner of pretense. Her eyes were cold and the sun-kissed bronze of her cheeks went white underneath. “That’s why he’s got me.”
Ahead in the Heat Page 20
