“Jordan.” He groaned and she looked down. His hand shook.
Something primitive stirred. She’d made him tremble. She began unbuttoning his shirt while he opened the door. He took her mouth again and walked her backward inside. There were no words, just an urgency that quivered between them. Faster than she would have believed herself capable of, she pulled at his belt, unbuckled it and unzipped him.
The door closed, engulfing them in darkness. He made an impatient sound and she heard him fumbling for the light switch.
An insane urge to giggle rose up, to arch her back and throw her hands in the air and cry out in delicious freedom. Freedom from the restrictions she’d set for herself six long years ago.
The overhead light snapped on. Cole framed her face with his palms and dipped his head to resume the kiss. She could taste the bite of the Cuervo Gold and his raw hunger. Both fed her appetite for him. His hands slid to her shoulders and around her back, edging up under her T-shirt. “Take it off,” he mumbled against her lips.
While she jerked her shirt over her head and flung it onto the dresser, he grabbed a condom packet from his jeans, then tossed them aside and pulled her back into his arms. His lips traveled down her jaw to her collarbone, nuzzling down to the edge of her bra. With a hoarse moan, he tugged it down, lifted her breasts, and mouthed one nipple, suckling hard.
Jordan clutched his head. Too much. Too many sensations at once. Sharp aches at her core. Stinging, swelling clit. Liquid desire flooding her passage. He moved to the other nipple and drew it into his mouth, teasing it with his tongue.
The room tumbled and she closed her eyes as he picked her up and carried her to the bed. She lay back, stretching like a cat as his hands fumbled with her jeans. Cool air hit her hips and legs as he slid them and her panties down to her ankles. Another grunt of impatience as her sneakers and socks came off, along with her jeans. Her bare feet were caught in warm hands and placed flat on the mattress so that her knees bent and she let her thighs fall open. She rubbed her aching nipples, wet from his mouth.
“Oh, man,” he rasped. “Do that again.”
She opened her eyes and rose up on her elbows. He was staring at her hands as they cupped her breasts.
Their gazes met and she began caressing herself and lightly pinching her nipples. She should be self-conscious, embarrassed. But she loved how his lids drooped as he watched and his eyes turned all hazy.
He moaned. “You’re so beautiful.” Still watching her, he wrenched off his shirt and briefs and for the first time she saw the scars that covered his right side. But even they couldn’t detract from the breadth of his shoulders and his muscled torso. His chest was the perfect combination of dark hair, small, tight nipples and rock-like abs. Her stare wandered down to his strong erection and his large, muscled thighs.
He raised a knee onto the bed, crawled up to settle between her legs, and caressed the back of one hand along the inside of her thigh. “I’ve been dreaming of this since that night in the desert.” Slowly, he lowered his head and slid his tongue into her entrance.
She cried out and her hips lifted off the bed.
His teeth lightly scraped as he sucked and licked. He took his time, pleasuring her with patient thoroughness until he reached her clit. His tongue teased and his lips caressed until Jordan was a whimpering, wiggling mess. But he allowed no resistance. He clamped one hand around her thigh to hold her open and nuzzled in deeper, using his fingers inside her.
Need spiraled, the pressure built, swirling into a hurricane of sensation as his mouth and tongue and fingers worked in her, around her. Her back arched off the bed and she screamed his name as white-hot, blinding pleasure burst from the inside out.
Before she could recover he moved over her and pushed inside. Her body adjusted to the length of him as he filled her completely. Another round of spasms shot through her as he pulled out and thrust again, then lowered to his elbows above her, his hard chest hot against her breasts.
“Jordan.” His face was tense, but his eyes were warm, filled with wonder. “I don’t want to go tomorrow. I don’t want to leave…you.” He began to move.
His words overwhelmed her. Too many feelings she’d suppressed for too long swirled around, confusing her. She combed a dark strand back from his forehead and ran her fingers through his hair, then rose up to kiss him.
Wrapping her arms around his neck, she clung to his bunching shoulders as he pumped inside her with deep, driving motions. “I love being inside you.” He clamped his jaw shut, wrapped his arms beneath her back and his thrusts got harder, faster, until he drove into her one last time. His eyes squeezed closed, he shuddered, tense and straining. Then he collapsed beside her.
They lay there a long time, damp, sweaty, till their breathing calmed and bodies relaxed. Tentacles of a deep languor pulled at Jordan’s body and spirit. But she awakened when she felt Cole get up. She heard him pad to the bathroom and then heard water filling the tub.
He came back to the bed and unhooked her bra and slipped it off. With ease he carried her to the bathroom, lowered her into the hot water, and then stepped in, facing her.
As he sat, he lifted her foot and began massaging her instep with both his thumbs. Jordan moaned and leaned her head back against the rim. Heaven. His large hands wrapped around her foot, strong, and yet gentle, soothing.
“I’m sorry. Maybe you wanted to go out to celebrate?” He cupped her heel in one hand and squeezed, while his other thumb kneaded into the ball of her foot.
“No. This is amazing.” With her eyes still closed, she smiled.
He lowered her foot and took the other one, massaging it with the same expertise.
When the silence went on too long, she opened her eyes, lifted her head and looked at him. Simmering chocolate-brown eyes pierced her. “What?”
“How’d you end up in Vegas?”
She stilled. Why talk about her past with him? This was supposed to be a one-night fling. “How do you know I haven’t lived here all my life?”
His brows drew together. “Your mom mentioned a few things.”
Jordan pulled her foot from his grasp and drew her knees up, hugging them to her. Talk about a mood killer. Who knows what else her mom had told him?
“Tell me.” He reached across and cupped her face, caressing her cheek with his thumb.
Oh, what did it matter? Meeting his gaze, she drew in a deep breath. “My story is disgustingly unoriginal. Girl meets boy. Boy seduces girl into running off to Vegas. Boy takes off and leaves girl stranded.”
He dropped his hand. “I want to find the bastard and maim him.”
“It was so long ago. He doesn’t matter anymore.”
“He hurt you.”
He said it so tenderly. Suddenly her eyes stung with unshed tears. A protective armor seemed to fall away, letting feelings flood in. She realized she’d had to be strong for so long she’d never allowed herself to acknowledge the pain. There hadn’t been time to grieve. Only survive.
“Do you…do you still love him?” His voice, was low, hesitant.
“No.” She pulled from his grasp and moved to kneel between his thighs. Water sloshed and splashed around them as she placed her palm on his cheek and lightly touched her lips to his. “I just haven’t let myself feel anything since then. But I can let the hurt go now.” She pressed gentle kisses on his nose and eyes and then moved to his right temple and down his scarred neck. “I don’t want to be closed off from my feelings anymore.”
His arms came round her and brought her to him. “You’re amazing.” He moved her hair off her shoulder and kissed her there.
“Have you ever…thought you were in love?”
He shook his head. “I’ve always wanted more out of life than a mortgage and two-point-five kids.”
“Did you always know you wanted to be a fighter pilot?”
He grinned. “No, I, of course, wanted to be an astronaut. I used to want to be the first man to walk on Mars.”
“Wo
w, big dream.” She raised her brows.
He shrugged. “It didn’t seem out of reach. My dad always talked about the day Neil Armstrong first walked on the moon. How amazing it was. When I was ten, he took us to watch the space shuttle Atlantis launch from Kennedy Space Center. Skipped school to do it.” His gaze wandered to the ceiling and he leaned his head back against the shower tiles. “We drove all night and watched the sun come up.”
He was quiet a moment as if remembering, then lifted his head and looked at her again. “After that I read all about the Galileo probe, and tracked it for years thinking someday I’d go to Jupiter, too.”
“They have a probe that went all the way to Jupiter?” She turned and sat between his raised knees, leaning back against his chest.
“Yeah. Took six years.” He picked up the soap and rubbed it between his palms. “It witnessed a comet crash into Jupiter in ’94, orbited it thirty-five times and sent back over fourteen thousand images before it disintegrated in Jupiter’s atmosphere in 2003.”
In 2003. Seemed like a lifetime ago. She’d graduated high school that May and run off with Ian.
“So, you joined the Air Force to be an astronaut?”
He nodded and his soapy hands cupped her breasts and began caressing them with a slow thoroughness. Jordan moaned.
“That was the plan.”
“And you love being a fighter pilot?”
“Oh, yeah. There’s no other rush like flying faster than the speed of sound. Went right into the Air Force Academy out of high school. Went to flight school at Randolph in San Antonio, and then trained at Nellis before I was deployed to the Middle East.”
She turned in his embrace and raised her fingers to the scars along his shoulder.
“Tell me how it happened.” She felt his body stiffen and feared she’d destroyed the moment.
With slippery hands, he lifted her onto his lap and cradled her in his arms. “I was assigned to a special tactics squadron. Our mission was to fly in undetected and establish an assault zone.” He was silent for a moment and stared across the bathroom.
“It was my own fault. I got too cocky. Flew in low to draw attention away from ground forces—against orders.”
She leaned her head back to look at him. “Did it work?”
He grinned. “Of course.” His thumb caressed the side of her breast. “But the insurgents had a missile launcher and I got hit. Still received a letter of reprimand.”
“You could have been killed.” The thought caused a horrifying lump in her throat.
He shook his head. “I ejected in time.”
“But what if you hadn’t? What if you’d been knocked unconscious? Or been taken prisoner?”
He shrugged. “I’d rather risk it than live life in half measures. If I had it to do over, I’d—” He stopped. “Damn.”
“What is it?”
His arms tightened around her. “I’ve been pissed at myself for being such a hothead, for ruining my career. But—” he shook his head “—if I had it to do over, I know I’d do the same thing. Every time. Even if it meant losing everything, I wouldn’t change what I did.”
“That’s where we’re different. I’d give anything for a do-over. Not for myself, but because I hurt my mom so much by running away.”
He squeezed her to him and she wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed her cheek to his shoulder. “I’m sure she understood and forgave you.”
Emotions she’d never wanted welled up, an awareness that this experience with him was something more than just sex.
On his right arm, just below his shoulder were the remnants of a tattoo. It looked like a drawing that had been half erased. The rest was all puckered new skin. She traced a finger around it and his gaze followed hers.
“It’s a red-tailed hawk,” he said softly. “A raptor. It’s the name for—”
“—the F-22, I know.”
She looked up and their gazes met.
“I figured I’d get another one on my left arm sometime.” He brushed the damp hair off her shoulder and slid his hand around her nape, bringing her mouth to his so sweetly, so gently.
With her defenses down, every emotion seemed intensified, every sensation sacred. He’d leave in the morning and she’d never see him again. She wanted to remember this night forever, the intimacy of her breasts pressed to his chest, the sanctuary in his arms, and the possession in his touch as his hands ran down her back.
His kiss enveloped her, surrounding her in a cocoon of protective warmth. He tangled his fingers in her hair as his other hand slid down the column of her throat to her breast and squeezed and played with the nipple. She could feel his erection hard against her stomach.
With one arm around her waist, the other beneath her bottom, he lifted her as she straddled his lap. “I wanted to go slow the next time, but…” With a groan he gripped her hips and pushed her down over his hard length. His head thrown back, his eyes closed, he moved inside her.
Jordan gripped the rim of the tub behind his shoulders and rocked her hips to create a rising friction.
He groaned her name. His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed and she lowered her mouth to the tendons at the junction of his neck and shoulder, nipping her way up his scars to his earlobe.
He slid his hand between them and began to stroke her.
Jordan cried out as he brought her to a writhing, sobbing pleasure. Water sloshed over the edge of the tub as her movements became more frenzied, but she didn’t care. With every rise and fall of her hips she felt her passage stretch for him, felt him so deep inside her, filling her. The thought sent her over the edge. She gripped his shoulders as wave after wave rocked her.
He bent his knees and curled his fingers into her waist as his hips rose and he spent himself inside her.
Falling limp against him, she laid her head on his shoulder, satiated as she’d never been before. Lazily, she listened to his breathing return to normal and knew she’d never forget this night, this experience, this man. Not for as long as she lived. She’d be an old lady, a grandmother, a great-grandmother, and she’d still recall this night.
His chest rose as he drew in a deep breath and sat up. “Jordan. I didn’t—Are you…protected?”
Omigosh. She wasn’t. How could she have ever expected this? For a panicked moment, Jordan drew a complete blank as she tried to remember where she was in her cycle. Think, Jordan. This was the third week of May. Memory returned. She should be safe.
“Um…no, but, it should be okay,” she said with more confidence than she felt. Wouldn’t that be the stupidest thing she’d ever done? Just as she was getting her life straight.
“Are you sure? I can’t believe I didn’t even think about it. Just so you know, I’ve had all the tests.”
She nodded, but she wanted to slap herself. “I’ve never needed to.” Before now. She’d always insisted Ian wear a condom. How could she have been so irresponsible this time?
“Okay.” He let out a deep breath. “But you promise you’ll contact me if…I’ll leave my contact info, all right?” He stood, water sluicing down his skin, and bent to give her a hand. “You hungry?”
Her stomach growled, but the reality of her situation hit her hard. Did he think she was trying to trap him? He’d made it clear from the beginning he wasn’t the home-and-hearth kind of guy. She had to get to her place, be with her mom. She shouldn’t have stayed this late. What would Mrs. Simco say?
“No, I should go.” Shoving her hair out of her face, she tried to stand on her own, but he clasped her elbows and lifted her against him, skin to skin. Their gazes locked. Then he stepped out and grabbed a thick, fluffy robe from a hook and draped it around her shoulders.
The spell of the evening had definitely been broken.
As she pushed her arms through the sleeves, he wrapped a towel around his waist and padded into the suite. “Are you sure I can’t get you something?” he called to her.
Jordan closed her eyes. He was trying to fill the awk
ward silence. One would think she’d have learned by now that acting irresponsibly always had its consequences.
She forced herself to leave the bathroom and started gathering her clothes and backpack. “The lady who watches my mother will be wondering what happened to me.”
“Oh, right. Of course.” Cole grabbed her T-shirt and handed it to her. “So, your mom can’t stay alone at all?”
“No, not anymore.” She stood clutching the robe together at her neck with her clothes bunched in front of her. She wanted to retreat to the bathroom to dress, but it seemed kind of silly after what they’d done together. For a moment she let herself relive the feel of his mouth on her, of his hard body against her, of him coming inside her. It seemed strange to think she’d never see him again after tonight.
“It’s Alzheimer’s, right? Who watches her? You have a nurse?”
“No, right now, it’s a neighbor of mine, Mrs. Simco. She’s really good with her.”
He nodded, meeting her gaze without pity this time. “How long has she been sick?” Casually, he dropped his towel and pulled some clean briefs from a drawer.
“It’s been about three years since we noticed the initial symptoms.” Jordan was still standing with her clothes in her arms. She dropped everything on the bed and started dressing. “At first, she forgot normal things. Like we all do sometimes. Certain words, or where she’d put her glasses.” She remembered those early days, when her mom would call from Iowa, and Jordan would make a joke about Alzheimer’s. “Then one day I called home, and she was crying and scared. She’d been late for work because she couldn’t remember how to get to the diner. That’s when she knew something was wrong. She’d worked at that diner almost twenty years.”
“I can’t imagine what she’s been through. What you’ve both been through.” While she talked, he’d pulled on the same jeans and shirt he’d worn earlier.
Jordan nodded. No one could unless they’d lived it.
“I’ll give you a ride.” He sat on the edge of the bed and tugged on his boots.
Let It Ride Page 8
