by Skye Jordan
She couldn’t keep her mind drifting to the sick look in Phillips’s eyes when he had her pinned against that wall, and she was pissed, so damn pissed, she’d frozen when she should have slammed her knee into his balls. At the same time, his sheer size and strength made her second-guess her ability to ever make a dent in a man that big, let alone get away after she’d pissed him off.
Then she thought of Noah confronting him… Fear and fury battled in her heart. Her hands clenched; her muscles quivered with tension.
The door opened, and Noah slid in. His hair was falling out of its style, his face was flushed, his jaw tight. He turned toward her, his hands gripping her forearms. “Are you all right?”
“No, I’m not all right,” she blurted. “I’m pissed. I’m pissed as hell. We’ve gone through weeks of work to get your ankle stable. You go to the X Games in a week, Noah, a week. And you start a fight with Goliath? What in the hell is wrong with you?”
Just voicing the reality wound her tighter. But Noah hardly seemed ruffled as he pressed a button that lifted the privacy glass so the driver wouldn’t have to listen to them argue.
“This is your career, your livelihood, your life,” she said. “You could have reinjured yourself. You could have ruined all the work we’ve done. You could have seriously killed your career, for what? What were you thinking?”
He slouched against the seat at an angle, body loose, looking so goddamned sexy in that suit, his hair mussed, a confused expression carving that vertical line between his brows. “I was thinking that the fucker was abusing you. And I sure as hell wasn’t going to stand by and let him have his way until your head cleared enough to set him straight.”
“Just because I didn’t go in for the kill at the first sign of trouble doesn’t mean I wasn’t prepared to do it,” she lied. “I was fine, Noah.”
But she wasn’t fine, and they both knew it. She wasn’t even close to fine. The adrenaline was wearing off, her concern for his well-being fading now that she saw with her own two eyes that he was in one piece, free of pain, and the source of her shakes had transitioned from anger to fear. Fear of what would have happened if Noah hadn’t come into the hallway. Fear of who saw the exchange and what rumors that would bring. Fear of what sick game Phillips would play now.
“Dammit, Noah. All you did was piss him off even more. Now he’s going to think I’m not strong enough to stand up to him, which is only going to give him the green light to come after me with twice the vengeance. I should never have come to this stupid event. Fucking Drake. Every time I listen to him, my life goes into a tailspin.”
Her brain felt like a ball of strung-out Silly Putty, and her emotions bounced between anger and guilt and fear and shame…
Noah leaned toward her, sliding one arm behind her shoulders, the other beneath her knees, and drew her across the seat toward him.
“Stop it.” Julia pushed at his shoulder. “I don’t need a savior, dammit.” But all her squirming and struggling in the small space only succeeded in repositioning herself from sitting on his thighs to straddling his lap. “I’m fine.”
But his arms held her tight. “Maybe I’m not fine.” He slid his hands over her hips, up her sides, and cupped her face. His gaze was deep and dark and overflowing with emotions—anger, residual fear, lust. “Because seeing you with him scared the ever-loving shit out of me.”
He pulled her head down and fitted their lips together. Julia tried to pull back, but Noah slipped his hand behind her neck and held her there as he swept his tongue into her mouth. His other hand curved around her hips, tucking her tight against the hardening rod of heat behind his zipper.
His tongue swirled in hungry waves; lips suckled and sipped. Julia tasted lime and desperation and raw Noah. Heat gathered between her legs; pressure climbed. His arms were tight, his body warm, his mouth hungry. He was holding her, loving her, all without question or accusation. That combined with the adrenaline still pumping through her body set Julia on fire.
She leaned in, sinking her hands into his hair and scraping her nails along his scalp the way he loved. Then she pressed the front of her body to his, wrapped her arms around his neck, and tilted her head to take more of his mouth. Noah groaned in approval, tightened his arms, and lifted his hips, rubbing his stiff cock against her heat.
But it wasn’t enough. Her body raged with sensation, and she needed more. She pulled out of the kiss and went for his belt, button, and zipper. She needed him inside her, filling her. Needed his arms around her. Needed the safety he offered. The unconditional acceptance. Need, need, need. She needed so much—and it all came from one source: Noah.
Noah grabbed her wrists before she reached skin. “I’m not doing another one-off with you, Julia. I want more. Need more. I care about you, goddammit.”
Lust made her mind float and fizz. “This is all we have. You said yourself, we live four hours apart—”
“Give me the rest of your time here. One hundred percent together every minute of the time we have left.”
Why? She had to swallow hard to keep the word from coming out. Sure it was only another week or so, but after what he’d learned about her tonight, she didn’t understand why he’d want more than casual sex without strings.
But one of his hands moved beneath her dress where it rode up on her thighs, his fingers slipping beneath the band of her panties and sliding over her ass. His hands were warm and strong, and Julia sighed with the sensation, until his fingers darted directly to her heat and stroked her opening, making her groan with an urgent hunger. Everything inside her ached with the craving she’d suppressed for weeks, but now she needed his comfort, his trust, his belief. She needed to feel him inside her, filling that empty space that lived at the center of her chest, the one she’d ignored for too long.
Leaning away, she reached for his boxers again.
Noah caught her wrists and held them tight while his open, hungry gaze drilled into hers. “Mine,” he said. “For the time you’re here.”
The thought both thrilled and terrified her. Everything in her mind said no. But her body, her heart, her soul screamed yes. Her brain urged her to make him promise he’d be discreet, but he hadn’t questioned her about Phillips, and he deserved the same unconditional belief.
She nodded her answer.
Something flickered in his eyes, something dark and sexy. His hands released hers to grip her face firmly, his gaze lowering to her mouth. “Say it.”
She drew a shaky breath. “I’m yours.”
He exhaled in a whoosh, as if he’d been holding it back, and tension ebbed from his shoulders. He kissed her hard, his hunger loose and raging, only breaking out of the kiss to pull a condom from his pocket.
Julia reached inside his boxers, curled her fingers around his thick, hot length, and drew his cock free. Her mouth watered. Her pussy clenched. Her heart spiraled into a knot. She’d never felt as desperate or vulnerable as she did now, needing to feel him inside her to right her world again.
Noah must have felt the same urgency, because he rolled a condom on quickly, pushed her panties aside to clear her opening, and pulled her down onto his cock, impaling her in one thrust. Julia’s throat closed around a gasp. Her fingers dug into the shoulders of his jacket. Sensation swamped her, and she closed her eyes and arched. Noah stilled, breathing hard.
He drew her mouth to his with a murmured “Mine,” against her lips before he kissed her—long, slow, deep kisses that made Julia wet and restless.
When she pressed her knees to the seat and slowly lifted her hips, dragging his thickness against her walls, Noah groaned and broke the kiss. He tugged one side of her dress down to expose her breast and took it into his mouth, sucking.
The hot, wet pressure on her nipple made her sex clench and weep. Noah growled, the sound filled with pleasure and possession.
Julia wrapped one arm around his head, holding him to her breast as she rode his cock in full strokes. Christ, he was perfect. So damn perfect. Her body tighten
ed, the pleasure intense and frenzied, emotions foreign and wild. Emotions that drove her need. Noah responded as if he understood perfectly, lifting into her with power and passion until Julia was on the edge.
“Open your eyes, gorgeous,” he rasped, his breathing harsh and quick. “I want you looking into my eyes when you come.”
Julia parted her lids and found Noah’s head resting back against the seat, his eyes dark, handsome face fierce with passion. Too wickedly sexy to appreciate when she was so close to orgasm.
“That’s it.” His big body trembled with pent-up lust. His fingers dug into her ass where he guided her hips down to his. “Ready, baby?”
“Yes,” she barely whispered, the orgasm sweeping in as if he’d given permission. “Yes,” she said again, louder, the pleasure rising in a wave—through her sex, her pelvis, her belly, her heart. “Yes.”
The wave crashed hard, making her shudder and gasp. She dropped her head to Noah’s shoulder, fisted her hand in his hair, and rode out the bliss even as Noah’s orgasm broke. His hips pumped hard, growls of pleasure rumbling in his throat.
Julia held him tight as residual shudders rocked their sated bodies, and the car filled with the sound of their quick breaths. As she floated down from the high and her mind cleared, those wild emotions swept back in, pushing tears to her eyes. Julia squeezed her lids shut, forcing away the burn. The unfamiliar sensations of fear and vulnerability lingered, but they were mixed with deep gratitude and affection for Noah. For reasons she didn’t understand, she felt intensely connected to him with a depth she’d never experienced before.
Instead of letting fear reign, instead of pulling away from the intimacy, Julia pressed close as they lifted from the orgasmic haze. She floated, letting herself enjoy the aftermath of what they’d just shared. This man was special. Someone she would remember the rest of her life—and not for her first sex in the back of a car either.
Her feelings for him outshone all the night’s drama. She only had him for a short time. And there, safe in his arms, Julia forced herself to let go and just exist in the moment, because there wouldn’t be many moments like these left before their time together came to an end.
Noah traced the curve of Julia’s bare shoulder with his fingertips. After he’d dealt with the condom, she’d climbed right back onto his lap and snuggled close. She’d been either sleeping or drifting in and out for the last fifteen minutes. Outside the car windows, night road crews had forced three lanes into one, and they crawled in bumper-to-bumper traffic. But Noah couldn’t care less.
He turned his head to press his face into Julia’s hair and closed his eyes as he took a long, deep lungful of its gentle floral scent. She lay heavily against him, her breath warming his skin and, shit, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt so happy. So insanely content. Yes, the sex was out of this hemisphere, but that wasn’t what had his heart tugging and twisting in ways he didn’t understand.
He was in serious trouble. He was crazy about her. Borderline deliriously crazy about her. And there was no easy fix for their situation. After the X Games, he had fourteen more competitions in four different countries. He wouldn’t touch down in Lake Tahoe again for months. And considering how she’d felt about the idea of staying at his home without training him, he seriously doubted she’d be open to a come-along-with-the-circus-and-be-my-side-girl-to-snowboarding situation this spring.
“How close are we?” Her feather-soft, sleepy voice broke the silence and created another one of those bittersweet pangs.
Noah cleared his throat. “About fifteen minutes in this traffic. If we got out and walked, maybe three minutes. But I’m certainly in no hurry.”
She sighed and repositioned her head on his shoulder, kissing his neck. “Me either.”
The fact that she didn’t climb off him and shut down again was a good sign, but there were still several elephants in the room they needed to address, and she was a captive audience at the moment.
He picked up a strand of her hair and twirled it around his finger. “Does Drake know?” he asked. “About Phillips? Your swimming? Your medals?”
She stiffened, sat up, and braced herself on his shoulders.
Dammit.
Her surprise melted into resignation. “I figured you’d hear at least some of the talk, but I guess you got an earful.” She shook her head and dropped her gaze. “I’m so sorry I dragged you into my mess. The only reason I even considered coming tonight was because Drake assured me Phillips would be at another event in New Orleans.”
He slid a finger across her forehead, pushing another strand of hair out of her eyes, and kept his voice soft when he admitted, “I hate the idea of you two keeping secrets behind my back.”
“We weren’t keeping secrets, Noah.” She let her hands fall to his stomach. “It was just my own pathetic attempt to ignore the problem, as if I could get past it by not dealing with it.”
“What happened between you and Phillips?”
She pressed her lips, shook her head. “Let’s just say he doesn’t take ‘no’ for an answer very well. I dinged his ego, which pissed him off. He gave my boss an ultimatum—him or me. And Phillips was obviously more valuable.”
“Why didn’t you fight it?” he asked. Tiffany’s question had been rolling around in Noah’s head since he’d first heard it.
“Come on.” Her shoulders slumped, and she gave him a seriously? look. “I’m nobody. For me, the situation was crystal clear. I could walk away quietly and try to find a similar job after the rumors died down, or I could fight, make a lot of enemies, and burn lots of bridges over a he-said, she-said battle I’d never win. Not against him.”
“You’re not nobody, Julia. You’re an Olympic gold medalist.”
“The spotlight was long gone by then. I’d changed my name. And using my real name at that point would only have made everything worse.” She took a deep breath and sighed, reaching forward to mirror his actions and tuck a strand of his too-long hair behind his ear. Noah covered her hand with his, drawing her wrist to his lips for a kiss.
“I love what I do,” she said. “I love working one-on-one with athletes. I love helping them heal and achieve. I love watching them get back to what they were born to do. Holding on to this career for the rest of my life was more important than proving that asshole wrong. It still is.”
Julia reached down and refastened his pants, sliding the belt into place and tucking the tail beneath a belt loop. The gesture was sweet and intimate.
“Why didn’t you tell me about your swimming and your medals?” he asked, trying to keep his tone light, like it didn’t bother him. “I mean, it’s relevant to training. It’s infinitely more impressive than your degrees, though those are pretty sick too. But hundreds of thousands of people get through college. Very few become gold medalists.”
“I couldn’t tell you one thing without telling you everything, which is why I’ve tried to distance myself from the past.”
“Where’d your last name come from?”
“Bailey’s my middle name.”
“Hmm. How did you accomplish so much in so little time? You can’t be more than twenty six, twenty seven.”
“I’m twenty eight. While I was training for the Olympics, I got through my studies fast with dedicated instructors. Had finished my first two years by the time I should have graduated high school. When I hurt my shoulder, I went back to college and double majored. Because the courses were so closely related, I only had to take a handful of extra classes. Then I got my job with Performance—the only thing I used my Olympic history to help with—and finished my masters at night while I worked there.”
“Fucking impressive.” He was awed by her tenacity. Her ambition. And her resistance to put up with the shit he’d given her early on totally made sense. “Why swimming?”
“I was good at it at an early age, which thrilled my parents—and nothing I ever did was good enough for them. So I clung to that golden nugget and continued to swim. It worked
when I was winning but came back to bite me in the ass when I wasn’t. And when I hurt my shoulder in the plane crash, then blew it out at the Olympics because I swam when I should have rested and healed…”
She heaved a breath. “Everything fell apart. My boyfriend ran off with the latest rising star, taking all my money with him. My sponsors yanked all my financial support. And my parents blamed me for their sudden lack of social invitations. I all but evaporated for everyone. You’re everyone’s darling on the way up, and everyone’s dirty little secret on the way down.”
“Amen,” he murmured. “So many things about you make sense now.” Including how deeply they’d clicked, and why she was so different from other women.
“Aside from our families’ financial statuses,” she said, “I imagine our young lives were very similar. I grew up in the same specialized independent boarding schools for Olympic athletes that you did. Lived with the same daily expectations and pressures. The mindset and all the fears and insecurities that go along with it were burned into my neural pathways for most of my life.
“So when I made a new life after swimming, I let go of all the expectations and disappointment.
But to do that, I also had to let go of the relationships that went with them. And for the first time in my life, I just wanted to be Julia. I wanted to be normal. Unfortunately, my parents didn’t want a normal daughter. They wanted an extraordinary daughter.”
The car finally turned into the hotel’s parking lot, and Noah slid a hand over Julia’s hair, pulling her in for a gentle kiss. “No matter how you slice it, they got an extraordinary daughter. If they don’t realize that, it’s their loss.”
She smiled and eased off his lap but threaded their fingers as they waited for the driver to stop in front of the hotel.
“Who was that guy you were talking to when Phillips approached you?” he asked.
