by Jen Doyle
And so did he.
Chapter Fifteen
The Porsche was beautiful.
Not that Dorie went around waxing poetic about cars on a regular basis, but she didn’t think she’d ever been in the presence of something so spectacular and so incredibly out of her league. Other than the man standing next to her, of course. If she started thinking about that, however, she’d start hyperventilating. It was better to focus on the car.
Clearly amused, Nate asked, “So which of the brothers is into cars?”
“Seamus,” she said absentmindedly, her hand running over the top. “Cars and baseball.”
She couldn’t believe she’d agreed to go to Chicago with him. That did not a one-night stand make. Plus, the library reopening was in three weeks. Sure, they’d made huge strides this week thanks to all the help, but there was still so much to do. And she had the five thousand dollars in seed money from the Foundation that she still needed to decide how she wanted to use. But how could she not say yes to him? He was her fantasy—by actual definition.
Except the Nate Hawkins in her dreams didn’t laugh at her jokes. To be honest, Fantasy Nate wasn’t even that smart. He certainly didn’t cook dinner for her or get turned on by the way she looked in her glasses.
Her dream man, did, though. And that was terrifying.
“Right,” Nate murmured. “The Yaz fan.”
Dorie’s head jerked up. “You remembered.”
He wrapped his hands around her waist, pulling her to him, back to front, and making very clear that despite pretty much having had sex straight for the past twelve hours, he was still hard. For her. She was pretty sure her mouth was wide open but she was too stunned to move. When he leaned close and whispered, “I remember everything you say,” it did not help matters one bit.
Then his lips brushed down her jaw and it no longer mattered.
She closed her eyes.
“Every...” He kissed her neck. “Single...” His hand slid down her belly. “Thing.” He reached down between her legs, stroking her through the jeans that were supposed to protect her from this very thing, and a moan rumbled up through her.
“Nathan, is that you?”
Dorie froze at the sound of Mr. Grimes’s voice from the driveway.
“I saw the truck and—”
His voice cut off as he came through the garage door and saw Dorie standing there with Nate, although, thankfully, no longer with his hand nearly down her pants.
Oh, God. So she’d gone from being the baby girl of the Donelli family to being the slutty new librarian who had taken all of three days to hook up with her employees’ nephew. Awesome. She moved a few steps away from Nate and hoped that this did not look like, say, she was spending the weekend with a man she’d just had mind-blowing sex with on the floor of the library.
“Hey, Uncle A,” Nate said, not a care in the world. “Sorry. I called first, but I just got the machine.”
“Oh,” Al said, looking over at Dorie and then glancing away. “Just dropped your Aunt Laura off at your mom’s place.”
With a nod, Nate handed a set of car keys to his uncle. “Thanks for the use of the truck this week.”
An oddly grim look settled over Mr. Grimes’s face as he grunted and pointed vaguely at the Porsche. “So you’ll be taking care of this mess, then?”
“Yes, sir, I will.” In an unexpectedly sweet gesture, Nate leaned down and hugged the older man. “Love you, Uncle A.”
After a long hard look at his nephew, Mr. Grimes turned back to Dorie, nodded his head, and said, “See you Monday, I guess.”
Shoving her hands into her coat pocket, she smiled and nodded back.
When he left, Dorie whirled around to face Nate. “I can’t—”
He palmed her cheek and silenced her with a kiss. Not the carnal, I-can’t-stand-another-second-without-you kisses he was phenomenally good at. Instead, this was more along the lines of I won’t force you but I know you’re thinking twice right now and I’d rather you didn’t think at all. Except maybe about all of the things I can do to you with this ridiculously hot body I have, and these amazing hands, not to mention a mouth that, as promised, made you scream.
She whimpered in protest when he pulled away.
“You were saying?” he asked, his hand going down to her ass as he pulled her up against him.
She rested her head against his chest and sighed. “Never mind.”
Nate grinned and went to get their bags from the truck. He put them in the trunk and then opened the door for her, closing it behind her after she got in.
As they drove away from the farm, a quiet came over him that didn’t appear to be a happy one. She didn’t say anything at first, deciding that he had enough to deal with.
Her restraint lasted all of ten minutes. “If I had a car like this,” she muttered, “I’d be a lot happier when I drove it.”
“I don’t have a car like this,” he answered. “That’s the whole point.” Then he looked over at her, as though he’d just remembered who he was talking to. As if he wasn’t sure how much he wanted her to know.
“I know pretty much everything about you,” she admitted. Exactly why she’d run away from him this morning. Another conversation she didn’t want to have, but it was too late for that now. “If you have an issue with that, then you’d better turn around right now.”
His knuckles turned white as he gripped the steering wheel; the muscle in his jaw twitched. After a few minutes, he gave a bitter laugh. “So, you don’t mind driving around with the drunk-driving asshole who killed his fiancée’s baby.”
If her heart hadn’t already been broken for him, that would have shattered it.
Reaching for his hand, she didn’t pull away when he flinched, waiting instead for him to finally lace his fingers through hers. “I think it’s very easy for people to assume the worst and I think that you paid the price for that. I never thought you were that guy. I’m not that good at pretending.” She looked away, giving him a little space. “And just for the record, I wouldn’t sleep with ‘a drunk-driving asshole who killed his fiancée’s baby,’ or did any of the other things they’re saying you did.”
He swallowed hard and she felt the pressure as his fingers gripped hers, but he didn’t say anything so she added, “That said, I would consider a guy with a bum knee.”
She smiled when he gave an incredulous laugh before saying, “As long as we’re on record, my knee is fine.”
Um, yes. She’d seen it in action under somewhat strenuous conditions. She squeezed his hand. “I know.” From there she didn’t push. That was maybe enough for now.
When ‘for now’ stretched into another hour, she decided it was time to do something about it. “So have you ever had sex in this car?”
She had to grab the edge of her seat when the car jerked to the side. He looked at her, eyebrows raised. “What?”
“I said, did you ever—”
He cut her off with a laugh. “You are such a guy.”
Okay. She supposed she deserved that, considering she’d called him a girl last night. But she wasn’t going to let him redirect her. “Well?”
He pulled his hand out of hers in order to place it squarely at two o’clock on the wheel. “It’s a little too small inside for that to work, don’t you think?”
Well, yes. Probably. With a shrug, she answered, “The hood’s pretty big.” She looked at him, then out at the road passing by. “Big enough.”
This time his laugh was tinged with disbelief. “No. That isn’t something I’ve ever done.”
“That’s a shame,” she said, thinking that the tips of his ears turning red shouldn’t be so appealing. “Seeing that it’s going back tomorrow morning and all.”
Gripping the steering wheel even harder, he tightly said, “
It’s thirty degrees outside.”
She smiled. He was getting the point. “Hood should be warm.”
“Engine’s in the back,” he answered. A big smile came over his face. “Too bad that wasn’t one of the trivia questions.”
Right. She knew that. It was just that he was distracting her. But two could play at that. “Shouldn’t be that hard to warm it up.”
The silence lasted a little too long for comfort, broken finally when he said, “Why would you want to do something like that?”
He sounded so suspicious, like she was going to pull something over on him.
With a sigh, she realized he had good reason. “Because this is far too nice of a car for you to hate it as much as you do.”
Obviously surprised, he swung his head to her. “I don’t—”
“Yes, you do.”
Two minutes later they were off the highway. He took a turn off the exit ramp, then another soon after that, and then they were in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by cornfields and with no one else around. When he pulled to a stop on the narrow dirt road, he didn’t look at her. “You’re sure about this?”
With a roll of her eyes, she answered, “Well, not if you’re gonna make it sound like such a chore. The whole point is that it’s supposed to actually be fun.”
“Fun,” he muttered, as though it wasn’t a concept with which he was familiar.
Again with the glowering silence. Turning so that her back was against the door, she asked, “So tell me, Nate. What exactly is it that you do to have a good time?”
His entire body stiffened. “I play ball for a living.” His voice was ten times colder than it was outside. “How can that not be a good time?”
She wondered if the bitterness was something that he’d been dealing with for a while or if it was a relatively new development; either way, his public persona hid it well. Here, in the confines of the car, it was hard to miss. “You tell me.”
Since he didn’t seem inclined to do anything of the sort, she unbuckled her seat belt and got out of the car. Her eyes stung at the blast of icy wind and it did occur to her that this wasn’t one of the smartest things she’d ever suggested, especially as he was right about the damn engine and all its warmth being at the back of the car. But she wasn’t about to back out now.
She’d left her parka in the car and she shivered as another gust of wind hit her. Deliberately not looking at Nate, she hitched herself backward and looked up at the darkening sky. It took Nate all of five seconds to come out after her. He put his jacket over her shoulders—denim, with an incredibly soft Sherpa lining—and said, “You’re going to freeze to death.”
Closing her eyes, she pulled the coat tighter and breathed in the amazing scent of him. “How is it possible this smells so good?”
“You’re crazy,” he muttered under his breath. Then he gave a laugh that was equal parts wonder and appreciation, although she didn’t realize it was for her until she opened her eyes to see the intensity in his.
His hand trailed from her jaw, down her neck, down over her breast, its peak hardened by cold and anticipation. His fingertips alone sent heat coursing through her. She was already at the point of not breathing when the smile died on his lips and his eyes darkened. “You’re a fantasy come true. You know that, right?”
“Me?” The only time the word fantasy appeared in the same sentence as she did was when she was having one.
But then he was holding her, cradling her as though she was the most precious thing on earth. “You even taste too good to be true,” he murmured into her neck as he proceeded to nuzzle his way down the center of her body, covering her skin as quickly as he exposed it—wrapping her in his jacket, the sinfully soft lining tickling her bare skin. He rolled her jeans and panties down her hips to her thighs while keeping her warm with his sinful hands and tongue. He nipped and teased, tantalizingly close enough to let her know he was following the letter of the law if not quite the spirit, goddamn him, and within moments she was begging. And then, with just one brush of his thumb, he broke her. Shattered her entirely. It took her a few moments of breathless recovery before she realized he was just sitting there, practically in his catcher’s stance, looking up the length of her as he grinned.
“This was supposed to be for you,” she said, the words coming haltingly as the air slowly came back to her lungs.
He ran his hands from her ankles up her legs, stretching out over her as his grin grew wider. Reaching in under the jacket, his hand covered her breast. “That was for me.”
She shifted a little to give him access; no need to make him work too hard.
“And anyway,” he was saying, “the angle of the hood isn’t really that conducive to—”
“Stop talking,” Dorie said, grabbing him by the collar and yanking him into a kiss. She wasn’t strong enough to flip him onto his back the way he’d done to her twice the night before, but she sure could nudge and nuzzle him there, especially if she distracted him enough by fumbling with the buttons of his jeans. And he was sure as hell strong enough to keep her steady as she got to her knees and flung her leg over him. She sank down just enough to tempt him before saying, “I mean if you don’t want to...”
He reared up and grabbed her. Half-glaring, half-hungry, he reached into the pockets of his coat and pulled out a condom. He sheathed himself with it and then she quickly sheathed him with her body. It worked out perfectly as far as she was concerned. Except that, when he collapsed back against the car, pulling her down with him, he touched his forehead to hers and looked deep into her eyes. “I am so totally fallin—”
“No,” she snapped, hearing the words before he actually said them. Her heart leaped to her throat. She clutched at him, resting her head on his shoulder before he could finish the thought. She couldn’t even for a second allow herself to believe she’d heard what he was clearly about to say. “Shut up.” She squeezed her eyes shut. “Please just shut up.”
Okay, so obviously, not a one-night stand. But still just a...fling. With someone who’d spent his life in the extremes and whose life was so out of control at the moment that he was just looking for something—someone—to ground him.
Honestly. They’d known each other for a matter of days. Less than a week! She didn’t believe in love at first sight, or even love at multiple-and-increasingly-naked-sightings over the course of several days. She certainly wasn’t about to derail her life plans based on it.
Unlike most men she knew, he didn’t try to shy away from what he’d obviously—inconceivably—been about to say. At the same time, he didn’t try to say it again. He laughed softly, then stroked her hair for a minute before lifting his head and kissing her. There was still a smile in his voice when he said, “Okay, fine. Shutting up.” He shifted a little, slanting his mouth so that he could go deeper into hers.
She was well on her way to telling him to ignore what she’d said about shutting up when he asked, “Do you want to drive?”
Her eyes went wide as she sat up straight, nearly sliding right off the hood in the process. Was he kidding? “You realize I learned to drive in Boston. Who knows what damage I could do?”
He laughed. “A Red Sox fan and a Boston driver. You pack a mean punch, Donelli.” But he sat up, too. Looked over at her and smiled. “I think I’ll take my chances.” He held out the keys. “What do you say?”
Seriously? “I say that you’d better be ready to pay some speeding tickets, because I sure as hell can’t afford them.” She snatched them out of his hand and jumped off the hood before he could change his mind.
* * *
Dorie turned the car back over to him right before they got on the main highway. She fell asleep soon after, which, as far as Nate was concerned, was a good thing. He needed to get ahold of himself, and luckily he had the next four hours to do it. Half the time he found himself desperat
e to get her out of his head and the other half he wanted to grab her and hold on as if his life depended on it. Which it might, considering he’d felt his whole body come alive the moment she raised the bat over her shoulder and stared him down without an ounce of fear—defending her dinner, no less.
He’d turn his attention back to the road in front of him and his eyes would drift down to the hood and the vision of her laid out in front of him. Even the fact that he’d had a split second of wondering if maybe she was setting him up, if maybe there was some photographer on standby, didn’t seem to matter. Because that’s all it was: one split second of doubt, followed by twenty minutes of driving need. And to his dismay, he was now contemplating the idea of true love and happily-ever-after-type endings, which was ridiculous, of course—because no matter where his career was headed, his life was in Chicago and hers wasn’t. Reality would soon intrude.
Although he didn’t want to wake Dorie, he should check in with Pete. He had no interest in the cavalry—be it his ex herself or one of her minions—showing up on his doorstep, even though the plan was to meet in the morning. Courtney was unpredictable that way. He hit the button for the phone and pulled up Pete’s number. Thankfully, he got voice mail.
“Trip took a little bit longer than I expec—”
His voice cracked and he nearly swerved—again—when he felt Dorie’s hand close over his thigh. He finished his message, the words practically running together as one. “...Than I expected. Keys’ll be with the doorman by eleven.”
Making sure he’d ended the connection, he grabbed Dorie’s hand as she worked her way up farther. Sweet Jesus.
Through clenched teeth, he said, “Do you want me to be in another accident?”
