“A threesome.”
The term fell from his lips in a hoarse whisper. When Addison had suggested Kennedy kiss them both, Luke’s pulse had smashed into frantic flight. His gut had churned, his throat had thickened. As had his cock. Thickened in a sinful response to his cousin’s suggestion.
Stopping at the edge of the path, he looked up, finding a strip of isolated beach stretching out before him. No one was on it. Not a soul. The low waves lapped at the sand in gentle caresses, the sound of their fall a soft roar. Overhead, the blue sky went on forever, cloudless and so cerulean it almost hurt his eyes. It was the most serene scene Luke had ever seen.
And he felt like shit.
Not just shit, Luke. Horny. You’re still horny. Hell, your dick is still as hard as a bloody pole and your balls are about to burst.
He bit back a snarl. There was one way of fixing his solution. One surefire way.
Kicking off his thongs, he stormed toward the waves. Hooking his fingers under the hem of his shirt, he yanked it up over his head, throwing aside the item of clothing without care.
The sun kissed his bare torso and it felt good. Hot and scalding away his disgust. His dick pushed at his cargos, a stern reminder he was still wanting the woman back in her suite. The woman he’d left with Addison. One taste of her four months ago hadn’t quenched that lust. One kiss five minutes ago had only fed it more.
Another hot jolt of want surged through him, making his cock spasm. He ground his teeth and hurried his pace. The gentle waves splashed against his feet and shins, cool and exhilarating.
He kept going, driving his legs against the swelling water. As each wave flowed around his legs, his thighs, his dick throbbed harder. His nipples pinched tight against the coldness, but his balls didn’t shrivel. His cock didn’t shrink. He was hard and horny, and he was staying that way until he fixed this.
Another swell washed against him, over his stomach this time. It drove him back a little, enough to fire his determination. Two more steps and he was waist deep. Stare fixed on an oncoming wave, he sucked in a breath and dropped under its weight, letting the water surround him.
Resurfacing, he let out a groan. He was still hard.
Staggering a little under the rolling water, he planted his feet in the soft sand beneath him and closed his eyes. Damn it. What did he do now?
His cock throbbed. Pulsed. His balls ached. An image of Kennedy filled his mind. Her taste filled his mouth. He’d never forgotten it. To experience it again…
The memory of her kiss roared through him. Hungry. Wonderfully wicked. Demanding. Her tongue had moved over his with such greedy skill. A wave sloshed against his chest, knocking him back a step. He recovered, eyes still closed. Inside his head, he saw Kennedy naked beneath him on the sofa in her suite, on the bed in his hotel room. He saw her breasts revealed to him. He felt her nipple against his tongue, under his palm.
His cock didn’t just pulse this time, it twitched with such aching force a low groan of pain escaped him.
Steeling himself against the surf, against his lust, Luke drove his hands beneath the water and tore open his fly. His cock burst free of the floating material, distended and tight. He wrapped his fingers around its length, telling himself he was disgusting even as he allowed his mind to believe it was her fingers on his dick.
He snared his balls with his other hand, his grip far from easy. Closer to punishing in its pressure.
“Fuck me,” he moaned, squeezing his scrotum as he pulled on his shaft.
Tight, hot pleasure roared through him. He pumped his cock again, harder this time, the side of his fist striking his swollen balls. Balls currently being mauled by his other hand. Pleasure rolled through him, sinking into his groin. Shards of pain threaded through it, an intoxicating mix that made Luke’s breath catch in his throat.
He closed his fist tighter on his erection, pumping up and down, up and down. The cool water of the Pacific licked over his hot flesh, like a million unending kisses. His mind told him it was her tongue. His body told him it was Kennedy’s pussy. He fucked his hand in the ocean and let himself fall into the memory of her sweet sex.
He pumped and pulled and kneaded and jerked, his heart slamming in his chest, his pulse pounding in his ears, his groan stripping from his throat as an orgasm tore through him. From his swollen balls, his engorged dick. From the very center of his body, up his spine, like liquid fire, over his body and down into his groin again.
“Fuck!” he roared, bucking in the waves as his seed spurted from his cock.
He continued to pump his length, a punishing mauling of his lust he could no longer control no matter how he wanted to. When the last of his release burst from his tip, he opened his eyes, staring at the low waves washing against him. The sky was still so blue it hurt to look at, the water was still calm, the sun still glinted off its rolling swell like diamond kisses.
As serene as it had been before he entered the surf. And, despite the release of his pleasure, despite his orgasm, he felt more charged and hungry than ever. Whatever he’d hoped to achieve wanking off in the surf, he’d failed. He still wanted Kennedy. Wanted her. Ached for her. Christ, what did he do now?
Go back. Apologize. Ask her to dinner. Lunch. Ask her for a drink at the bar. Hell, ask her why she left your hotel room all those months ago when it’s obvious there’s something between you both.
He studied the distant horizon, letting the low swell roll around his waist. Something? Something like what?
You’re being an idiot, Luke. She bolted back in New York, just like you bolted now. What’s that tell you? That that “something” is nothing. Besides, you’re Rebound Guy, remember? That’s what she called you, and Rebound Guy never gets beyond the unattached fucking. Anyway, you can’t take her to lunch, even if she said yes. Aidan is getting here soon. His water plane is due to touch down at twelve thirty and what are you doing? Standing waist-deep in the Pacific jerking off. Nice. Real classy.
Suppressing a growl, he fumbled about in the water for his zipper and tucked his now-flaccid cock back into his cargos. What would his best mate have to say about the situation? Aidan Rogers was about as conservative as they came where sex was concerned. Hell, for the entire time Luke knew the guy—which was going on close to ten years now—the firefighter deputy captain had done little more than kiss a woman. Luke—along with just about everyone else in the world—knew Aidan had loved his best friend, McKenzie Wood, forever, but even Luke had to admit, no one ever expected the big guy to finally admit that to her, let alone pop the question. What would Aidan think of Luke’s state of affairs? Of Kennedy, their one-night stand, their kiss only a moment ago…
Does it matter?
It did if it came back and bit Luke on the arse.
He pulled a face. Aidan had hinted at something pretty amazing happening here when he and Mack had visited a year ago. Maybe this island was all about amazing things happening for friends and lovers.
But she isn’t your lover. She isn’t even a friend. She’s a stranger you had a one-night stand with. A stranger currently in Addison’s company.
The thought made Luke’s stomach knot. More surprisingly, his balls throb. Unbidden, an image of the three of them flashed through his mind. Naked. Moving together. Fucking.
He hissed in a sharp breath. Great, just what he needed. His less-than-conservative, deeply suppressed sexual appetites to rear their debauched heads at his best friend’s wedding.
“Jesus, what is wrong with you, Luke?”
His cock twitched, and he ground his teeth. A lot, it seemed. One minute he was thinking about the intangible “something” between him and Kennedy, the next he was thinking of a threesome?
Turning his back on the horizon, he began to make his way out of the surf. He needed to cool off. The surf hadn’t helped, his hand hadn’t helped, and the idea of a ménage with his cousin and Kennedy sure as shit hadn’t helped.
He emerged from the water in ungainly, powerful strides. The water str
eamed down his legs, his cargos so sodden and heavy they pulled at his hips like lead. Sand stuck to his wet flesh like a second skin, but Luke ignored it, making his way up the isolated beach. He wouldn’t go anywhere near Kennedy. He would leave her be. If Addison was still with her, well, good for him. His cousin had always been the player Luke never was. Perhaps it was better this way.
It took Luke ten minutes to make it back to their suite. In that time, he remembered his shirt and thongs were left somewhere back on that beach, had passed more than one group of wedding guests already on the island, nodded at the bride’s brother, Mitch, and dodged an interrogation from the bride herself. By the time he’d wrapped his fingers around the door handle of his suite and slipped his keycard into the lock, he was close to being back under some semblance of control. Close. It helped he could no longer smell Kennedy’s subtle perfume on his skin, nor taste her kiss on his tongue.
Letting out a ragged breath, he withdrew his keycard and shoved the handle down, ready to enter the silent refuge of his room.
And saw the butterfly. A damn red-bellied swallowtail. Fluttering past him, its wings tiny instruments of black, white and red flight.
Instantly, his body remembered Kennedy. All of her. Her naked perfection, her sensual smell, her talented mouth, her hungry, demanding, masterful hands.
And he was horny again.
Damn it.
Chapter Three
“…incredible talent and I’m sure you’ll be blown away by what she delivers, isn’t that right, Kennedy?”
Kennedy blinked. The question from Kylie Sullivan, the manager of Bandicoot Cove resort and her new boss, jerked Kennedy away from the thoroughly disturbing thoughts she’d been having about Luke Beasley and Addison Lancaster. She blinked, focusing her attention on the woman sitting beside her, and the two women sitting opposite. “Err…right.”
The redhead grinned. The bride. One McKenzie Wood. Kylie had told Kennedy that McKenzie was as far from a bridezilla as they came. The very fact the woman—an award-winning journalist—was happy to have her wedding photographed by someone she’d never met before said something. “Just some fun candid snaps. Maybe one or two silly ones. Neither Aidan or I are posers.”
The younger woman beside her—Bianca Rogers, chief bridesmaid and younger sister of the groom—burst out laughing. She was a tiny thing, with brilliant blue eyes, honey-blonde hair and a smile that said loud and clear not to mess with her. In a cheeky, friendly kind of way. “I would pay big bucks to see you and Danny pose for wedding photos. I mean, really pose.” She swung those direct eyes of hers toward Kennedy, her grin stretching. “Oh, oh, oh. Can you make them do one of those kitschy, ridiculous shots were my brother is removing Mack’s garter belt with his teeth? Please? Pretty please with sugar on t—”
Bianca didn’t get a chance to finish. McKenzie shoved her off the chair. Literally, shoved her off the chair.
Kennedy blinked again, a smile pulling at the corner of her lips at the laughing women before her. Well, if nothing else, the wedding was going to be a fun one. Maybe it would help take her mind off the enigma of her response to Addison and Luke.
At the thought of the two men her belly flip-flopped and her pussy fluttered. Fluttered, like the damn butterfly that started the whole situation.
The memory of Addison’s rather interesting departure from her suite came back to her. She’d scrambled from the sofa the second Luke stormed through the door, fighting with the towel to try to cover everything Addison had already seen. It hadn’t been necessary. Addison had been studying the open door.
“Well,” he said, his British accent as sexy as Luke’s Australian one. “I didn’t see that coming.” He’d swung back to her just as she’d wrapped the towel around her breasts, a smile part apologetic, part…well, part roguish, damn it. “Having a nice bloke for a cousin makes things a tad frustrating at times.”
Kennedy remembered thinking having a nice bloke run from the room in the middle of giving her the best kiss of her life made things more than a tad frustrating.
She’d parted her lips to say something smart and pithy to explain the situation, but nothing came to mind. Smart and pithy had obviously run from the room as well.
Addison had given her a slow grin. “Should I ask about what just went on? Or shall I let my cousin explain it?”
Her face had ignited. If it were possible for her cheeks to melt with the heat of her shame, they would have, slewing right off her face. Instead, she’d let out a sigh. “We kinda…” The rest of her sentence didn’t come, trapped in her throat as it was.
Addison’s answering chuckle still made the pit of her belly flutter. “So it seems.”
And then, with another grin that set Kennedy’s pulse running and her pussy fluttering, he said goodbye, leaving her alone, wrapped in a towel, her heart pounding, her sex throbbing and she’d never felt more…more frustrated.
The word of the day, it seemed.
Damn it all, she was attracted to them b—
“Kennedy?”
Kennedy started. The dismal realization she’d zoned out again flooded her cheeks with heat. First day on the job and she was sucking badly. She turned to Kylie, giving her new boss a steady smile. “Sorry?”
A slight frown pulled at Kylie’s forehead. “I asked if you will take black-and-white images, color or both?”
“Both.” She gave herself a mental slap. She was a professional. Letting herself be distracted by two guys—Two guys, Kennedy? Two?—was just plain woeful.
Shifting on her seat, she reached behind her and procured the large portfolio of wedding shots she’d brought to the meeting. She was a professional, damn it. She didn’t daydream about sexy, cocky Brits and dominating, powerful Australians during work meetings. She didn’t.
Of course you don’t. Which explains why your panties are all wet and your nipples are hard. Face it, Kennedy. You’re turned on thinking about them. Wondering if you can find them again. Suggest something no woman on her first day of work should suggest…
Lifting her gaze from the leather-bound folio on the table before her, she smiled at the bride-to-be and the bridesmaid who was once again back in her chair. For the next ten minutes, McKenzie Wood and Bianca Rogers managed to stop Kennedy from thinking of Luke and Addison. They were cheeky and funny, and before she knew it, Kennedy was laughing at their banter.
Yes, this was better. This was what she was here for. Not getting hot and bothered over Rebound Guy and James Bond. This was the way it was meant to be. Thank God the wedding was only two days away. With that little time left, she would spend the next forty-eight hours getting her equipment ready, unpacking her Mac, updating her software, charging the batteries of her cameras, planning shots and scouring the resort and local scenery on the island for the best locations to capture the joyous event. That’s what she was going to do. Not waste energy thinking about—
“Who do you think would win? Aidan or Luke?”
Every muscle in Kennedy’s body locked tight. Luke?
She jerked her gaze from the crystal water of the pool beside which they sat and stared at Bianca, wondering why the pixie-like bridesmaid had uttered Luke’s name.
McKenzie laughed, grinning at an open page on Kennedy’s portfolio. “Are you kidding? Beaso dragged Aidan out of a burning building and saved his life. There’s no way Aidan is going to let him beat him at that!”
Mouth dry, Kennedy slid her stare from the laughing women to the image they were studying. It was one of Kennedy’s favorites. One she’d taken at the last wedding she shot in the U.S. before accepting the job here at Bandicoot Cove. An image of a bride and groom having a piggy-back race against the best man and maid of honor along Coney Island Beach.
It was a fun, silly image, one she was proud of. But she couldn’t think about it. All she could think about was the names she’d just heard.
Luke.
Beaso.
Beaso? As in Beasley? The Australians had strange habits when it ca
me to nicknames, but surely Beaso meant Beasley?
Oh God, was Luke Beasley the best man at the Wood/Rogers wedding?
Was that why he got all strange when you said what you were doing here? He’s the best man. And you’re going to be photographing him, in his presence for close to twelve hours. So much for keeping your mind off him.
So what did that make Addison Lancaster? Luke’s guest to the wedding?
And why did that make her both worried and excited?
God, what was going on with her? Had she left her brain back in the U.S.?
“Kennedy?”
Kennedy bit back a curse. She straightened in her seat and gave her frowning boss a wide smile. “Sorry. I was thinking about something special to do with the shoot.”
Kylie’s answering smile said loud and clear she wasn’t convinced.
Way to impress the boss on your first day, moron.
“Well, if that’s it for now…” McKenzie rose to her feet. “Aidan’s arriving in twenty minutes, and I want to get ready for him.”
Bianca burst out laughing. “Way too much information there, Mack.”
McKenzie rolled her eyes at her future sister-in-law. “Deviant.”
Kennedy watched the play between the two women, unable to miss how stunning the bride-to-be was. McKenzie glowed, radiant and obviously utterly in love. It made Kennedy’s belly clench. She’d never been in love but had thought she may have been well on her way with Max until he’d blindsided her. One minute the proverbial happily ever after was on her horizon and the next, she was single and in a bar in downtown New York, shell-shocked and ordering tequilas straight-up. Two drinks later she’d met Luke, and as impossible as it had seemed, she’d laughed, smiled and lived more in her four hours with him than an entire relationship with Max. What did that say?
Connection. They’d had an undeniable connection.
So why did you run four months ago? And why do you find Addison so damn sexy as well?
“Anything you need to tell me, Kennedy?”
Sunset Heat: Bandicoot Cove 2 Page 3
