She tugged open the glass door, Harley twitching in reaction to the sudden creak and cooler draught of air but continuing to wash his hair. Sliding in behind him, Bree pressed her bare breasts to his back, tucked her hips against the tight mounds of his gorgeous butt and wrapped her arms around him. Hot water sluiced over his shoulders and soaked in her hair, but she kept her cheek pressed to warm, soapy-smelling skin.
She closed her eyes, exploring the contours of the taut landscape of Harley’s chest with her fingertips. After a moment, the flex of muscles against her cheek stilled and she cracked open an eye. Harley stood, palms braced on the shower wall in front of him, his breathing ragged. Encouragement enough to peel herself off him and grab the bar of soap. Just a little bit shaky, Bree worked a lather onto her palms and then glided her hands over his back.
Wet skin, smooth and hard. His flesh could’ve been chiselled by a master carver. Stroking in long, languorous movements down his spine, she squeezed deliciously firm butt-cheeks and then ran a single finger between them. Harley made a sound—a cross between a growl and a whimper—indentations dimpling his flesh.
Her nipples budded, and she allowed herself the momentary pleasure of rubbing them against his broad back as she once again lathered up her hands. This time, she reached around him, slicking her palms down his abs until they bumped into the base of his erection. She wrapped soapy fingers around him, spreading bubbles along his length. So thick and solid, she gripped him with one hand, and with the other ran her thumb over the sensitive crown, loving how his breaths shuddered through him as he thrust himself into her touch. Delicious throbbing started up between her legs, and only through sheer willpower alone—and the desire to pleasure Harley with the slow strokes of her hands—did she resist dipping her fingers between their wet bodies and taking care of that throbbing.
“Bree.” His hand captured hers, sliding her fingers away from his body and curling them into loose fists. Then twisting, he reversed their positions, and Bree found herself plastered against the shower wall with her wrists pinned high above her.
Harley dipped his head, his gaze fierce, focused, and scorching hot. She burned under it, her skin flushing as if the water temperature had doubled into scalding territory.
“It’s different now between us, ay?”
With all that solidly packed muscle keeping Bree upright—since her legs had melted to goopy jelly—figuring the meaning of his cryptic statement was beyond her mental capacity. The important thing was getting part of that solid muscle, the part prodding into her stomach, inside her.
“Complicated. There’s more at stake,” he added, as if that would herd her scattering brain cells into line.
Nope. Her brain cells, the sensible ones at least, had floated away like bubbles. And since the thigh wedged between hers was in a very agreeable position, the odds of making sense of his thought process any time soon didn’t seem likely.
“Not complicated.” She stretched up on tip-toe and then sank down again, causing a delicious friction between her legs that nearly crossed her eyes. “Not if you shut up and kiss me.”
“You’re pregnant.”
The two clipped words had the effect of someone flushing a toilet while the shower was running. Bree blinked up at him, ceasing the desperate grinding motions she’d been making. Her thoughts spun in a hazy vortex, her body trembling with arousal even as her heart thudded painfully in her chest.
“You don’t want me,” she whispered. The words were torn from her throat, ragged and bloody and she hated, hated that he still had power to wound her so easily.
His beautiful grey eyes crinkled with wry humour. “That’s definitely not it.”
C’mon brain, stop getting drunk on sex endorphins and function. Bree tried to wriggle her wrists out of his grasp, but Harley’s fingers didn’t loosen, so she dropped her forehead to his shoulder with a groan. “No, I mean, you don’t want to want me. I’ve gone stalker on you—and oh, God, you only pity-want me.”
He made a sound of pure male exasperation and released her wrists. The hot water abruptly vanished, and he simultaneously shoved the shower open with his foot and wrapped his arms around her, lifting her off her feet and depositing her outside the stall on the bathmat.
“Will you kick me in the nuts if I suggest hormones are fucking up your deductive powers?” Harley climbed out after her. He snatched a towel off the rail and flung it around her shoulders. He rubbed his big hands briskly down her arms, then patted the fluffy cotton against her waist and hips.
“I won’t kick you in the nuts for not wanting to sleep with me again because I’m pregnant.”
Harley muttered something, but Bree missed it with the distraction of him flinging her towel aside and propelling her backward until her butt hit the bathroom counter. He lifted her onto it, nudging her legs apart so he stood between them. Every internal muscle from her breasts to knees tightened with a deliciously warm squeeze as he cupped a thigh and drew her closer. His other hand stroked up her spine until he cupped the back of her head, gently forcing her to meet his eyes.
“Listen to me.” His thumb moved in slow, sensuous circles on her nape. “I want you—nothing’s changed in that regard. But we’re not just two people having a little no-strings fun together between the sheets any more. There’s a kid to think about. And what sort of relationship the people who created him have, or will have, if we continue sleeping together and strings do develop. We’d be walking into a minefield.”
Ah. She got it now. Some of the tension leaked out of her rigid backbone, but she kept it stiff regardless, so Harley wouldn’t see the tiny stabs of hurt piercing it. This was his way of warning her she risked a broken heart if she fell in love with him. Hell, she knew that. Just like she knew it’d be her who ended up in pieces when—not if—he walked away this time.
Because it was already too late for her. In fact, she’d never really fallen out of love with Harley Komeke. This time around, it was more a refresher course than a beginner’s 101 of Loving an Unobtainable Man Who’ll Never Love You in Return. So why hold back when one more time in his arms couldn’t hurt any less?
“Eyes wide open.” She placed her palm on his wet chest, over the steady thump of his heartbeat. Then, in case he didn’t understand her big girl who can take care of herself lie, she raked her nails lightly down to his stomach and wrapped her hand around the part of him that would understand.
“Don’t ask me if I’m sure,” she said when his mouth parted.
He didn’t.
Instead, he bent and kissed her thoroughly. A hot, deep kiss, coaxing a surrender from her he didn’t need to ask for. He broke away to lick water droplets from her throat, following her curves until his mouth closed over the tip of her breast. Suckling at her nipple, he swirled his tongue around the areola to pull it deeper into his mouth until she clutched at his head in abandon. Ripples of pleasure tugged from her breast straight down to her core. Her womb clenched in anticipation as Harley dropped to his knees in front of her, his broad shoulders pushing her legs apart and exposing her most intimate folds.
“Perfection,” he murmured.
He brushed the pad of his thumb over her entrance, spreading her moisture upward and slowly circling her clit…not touching the sensitive bundle of nerves, just tormenting her with the lightest of strokes either side. Delicate kisses on her inner thighs, his breath puffing warmly on the growing wetness between them. A shiver rippled through her as the stubble surrounding his mouth scraped her skin.
“I want to paint you like this,” he said, grey eyes intense before his tongue traced the path that his thumb had just taken.
Bree cried out at the sudden shock of sensation, her hips reflexively arching up toward his mouth. He gripped her thigh, sliding her slightly forward until his mouth was buried in her folds, licking and devouring her as if making her come in the next sixty seconds was his lifelong goal. She’d never been a nought-to-one-hundred type of woman, but with Harley? Every time he put his h
ands on her, or even looked at her with that glint in his eye that said he was thinking about putting his hands on her, she rocketed from “turned on” to “about-to-climax” faster than she’d ever thought possible. And the talented motions of his mouth and tongue, the sweet thrust of his fingers as he worked one, then two inside her…
She white-knuckled the counter edge and hung on for the ride. Bucking against him, she felt the first seismic trembles of an oncoming orgasm start deep inside, then it swept her away. She came hard, her cry of release shockingly loud in the silence.
Harley surged upright, kissing her again, the taste of her arousal on his mouth feeding a fire in her that wasn’t anywhere near ready to be quenched.
He pulled back. “I need you.”
Bree threaded her fingers through Harley’s hair, loving the feel of the silky strands between her fingers. “I know.”
His beautiful mouth creased into a smile and then grew serious. “I haven’t been with a woman other than you since my last health check, and I always use protection. But I’m happy to use a condom now, if you want.”
“A little late for that.” She pulled gently on his hair. “And you’re the only man I’ve slept with in, well, let’s just say it’s been a while, and I’m clear, too. No condom required.”
Harley scooped her into his arms and hooked open the bathroom door. “Hoping you’d say that.”
He carried Bree into her bedroom, lowering her on top of the neatly made bed and following her down onto it with smouldering kisses.
“We’re going to mess up the covers,” he said when they both came up for air.
“Don’t care.” She wrapped her legs around his hips, grinding against his erection, which she was sure had grown in the last minute. “That’s how much I need you, too.”
With a rough groan, Harley smoothed his hand down the back of her thigh, his fingers digging into her flesh as he eased inside her, one delicious inch at a time. Bree arched into him, drawing him deeper, biting her lip as he stretched and filled her so crazy-perfect. He stilled when they were completely joined, his mouth returning to hers. Internal muscles involuntarily clutched him tightly, as if her body had discovered that Harley was her missing puzzle piece.
“Hey,” he murmured against her lips, “you feel incredible.”
“Mention the phrase ‘like wet velvet’ and I will kick you in the nuts.”
Because snark was so much easier than admitting how desperately she wanted to believe they weren’t just having sex. That this time, Harley was making love to her.
He didn’t reply; instead, he smiled his brain-cell-destroying smile and braced his arms either side of her shoulders. He withdrew slightly then thrust back in a calculated move that had her breath hitching.
“Oh,” she gasped as he arched his back and bent to flick his tongue over her nipple, watching her reaction with a hooded—and hot—gaze.
He ground his hips against her again then started a slow, frictional campaign of pleasurable torture, thrusting inside her over and over. Between every second or third thrust, he kissed her, mimicking the motion of his body with his tongue. With long, slow strokes, the man was on a mission to blow both of their minds, and he wouldn’t be rushed.
Bree gripped his hair, lifting his face so his storm-cloud eyes met hers. In them, she saw the answer that both thrilled and terrified her.
This was no longer just sex—if it ever had been. This was Harley making love to her with an intensity and tenderness he might not realize he demonstrated. This was her, opening up to him, giving over control for the first time since he’d broken her heart so many years ago. This was trust overruling uncertainty, deep affection surpassing the need to protect her vulnerability.
His movements grew quicker, driving them both to the edge where she had no chance of holding back. She forced her gaze to remain locked on his, even as she shattered into a million pieces, moments before Harley growled out his own release and buried his face in her throat.
You play against a Komeke, you play with everything you’ve got.
This was everything. At least to her.
***
Harley kicked the motorbike to life, glancing up at Bree’s apartment even though he couldn’t see if the lights were still off as they’d been after he’d crawled from her bed. Dusk had fallen while they’d remained entwined together. Once he realized he wasn’t in any danger of following the white light into oblivion after the most incredible sex-that-wasn’t-just-sex-but-he-wasn’t-going-there experience, Harley sifted through his mental list for an original excuse to leave.
Only Bree beat him to it.
“You better go. Ford will want to lock up the workshop,” she said.
Dammit, that had been his number one in the running. And suddenly, he hadn’t wanted to leave, after all.
But he had, pulling on his damp shorts since he’d never got around to tossing them in Bree’s dryer. Staying meant he wasn’t as in control of this situation as he would’ve liked. Staying, hearing Bree whimper his name as she came again, maybe sharing a meal in her bed sometime during the evening, would’ve indicated an intimacy that was a disaster waiting to happen.
Complicated. Not just no-strings sex. More at stake.
His words…but at the time, he hadn’t gotten a handle on the depth of truth in them. Something had broken in him tonight—something unfixable. The wall around his heart, the construction started as a child and solidified from years of intimacy-avoidance, had weakened with cracks zigzagging down to the foundation. A Bree-shaped wrecking ball had caused the damage with the way she’d touched him, the way she’d looked at him with her heart in her eyes.
Harley jammed on the helmet and guided the bike around the gallery, pointing the front wheel in the direction of the lights glowing inside the workshop. The salty breeze drifting off the ocean filled his nose as he puttered along the road. Good. He needed the warm, loved-up woman scent out of it before he encountered Ford. And lied his ass off to his twin pretending he wasn’t in the exact same screwed-up position Ford had found himself in with Holly only a few months ago.
The workshop’s roller doors were open, an old UB40 song playing on the ancient portable stereo his father insisted on using. Harley killed the engine and slid off the bike, rolling it past a mud-splattered ute with its hood open and his father’s stocky body bent under it. Harley nudged the kickstand down and tugged off his helmet. Ford was nowhere in sight.
Shit. Lying to Ford was one thing—his bro was so tits-over-heels in love that he’d let a lot of things with Harley slide because Ford was too gone on Holly to spot them. Their dad, on the other hand…
“Pass me the twelve mil spanner.” Rob didn’t bother to lift his head from under the hood. He scrubbed a hand down his coverall-covered butt and wriggled his fingers in a hurry up and gimme it motion. “If you can see straight to find it after this evening’s escapades.”
Harley pretended to have no idea what his dad was talking about, even though the old man was perfectly positioned to notice Harley and Bree’s arrival home on the bike and then the hour long delay of returning it. He crossed to the toolbox and fished out the twelve millimeter spanner, then dropped it into his dad’s waiting hand.
“You here by yourself?” Harley’s gaze skimmed over the ute’s engine bay where his dad was doing something to the air cleaner.
“Hoping I wouldn’t be, ay?” Rhythmic creaking sounds came from beneath the hood. His dad chuckled. “Thought maybe you’d been avoiding your old man since you haven’t worked on the mural for a few days.”
“The weather’s been crap.”
The mural was three-quarters of the way complete, but he’d stalled a little bit, wanting to give Bree’s exhibition a little publicity boost by revealing it to the media at the same time. But then, with the work on Holly’s salon almost complete, he had no legitimate excuse to continue loitering in Oban.
Barring his involvement with Bree and fathering another child.
“Nothin
g to do with locking yourself away with Bree in her studio for hours at a time?”
“We’re working—I’m working.” He leaned a hip against the ute. “She’s posing for me. My take on Hineahuone. I’m thinking of calling it Drawing Breath.”
“Surprised you managed to talk a nice girl like her into that.”
Harley rolled his eyes since his dad couldn’t see. “She keeps her clothes on. It’s not that type of posing.”
His dad grunted in a tone that indicated he knew Harley was shovelling horse shit even if there were some grains of truth sprinkled in. “The painting will be in this gallery showing she’s got the local arties in a buzz about?”
“That’s the plan. She’s already got a couple of bigger names from the mainland signed on and interest from a few serious collectors, one as far away as Australia who’s indicated he’ll fly over.”
His dad turned his head and pulled his lips down in a that’s impressive frown. “The right buyer will earn Bree a pretty penny in commission, ay?”
“Won’t be enough to save her gallery. I offered to give her a loan—hell, to buy it outright.” Harley scratched his fingers along his scruffy jaw.
“Turned you down, did she?”
“Yep.”
“No surprises there.” Rob backed out from under the hood and braced his palms at the base of his spine, arching to stretch out the kinks. “Least you know she’s into you for your good looks and not your money.”
“She’s not into me.” Kneejerk reaction—a similar one to being grilled about whether he had a “little girlfriend yet” by teasing aunties and uncles as a young teenager. “Yeah, we have a kid together but…”
At his dad’s silently lifted eyebrow, Harley’s excuses trailed off.
“Wanna tell me what’s really going on?”
His dad didn’t wait for a reply but strolled over to the small workshop fridge and grabbed out two cans of beer. On his return trip, he tossed one to Harley and then dragged up a metal stool to perch on, cracking the tab on his drink.
Drawing Me In: A New Zealand Secret Baby Second Chance Romance (Due South Series Book 7) Page 22
