Happily Ever After

by Tanya Anne Crosby

  Was she feeling it as well? The electric current in the air? It sent fire racing across his skin.

  He was drawn to her in a way he hadn’t ever felt toward a woman. His skin burned, craving her touch. The points of his nipples were on fire for the soothing touch of her moist tongue.

  What would it feel like to be inside her? To have her legs wrapped around his waist and her tongue dancing on his nipples?

  She had no idea how close he was to forgetting she was a lady ... and remembering he was no gentleman. He was a pretender at best... and her kind never let him forget it.

  Never in his life had he felt so uncertain around a woman... or so attracted... or so wary... or so confused.

  And he’d never considered the word no before now... not in this way... never needed to. He had always been willing to accept the outcome, whatever it might be. For the first time ever, he dreaded hearing it.

  Sophie was from a world he could never truly be part of—not that he hadn’t tried. And failed. He had the money and the brains. He just hadn’t the name. And that in a nutshell was why he’d had to purchase this deuced ship himself, and fund his own research.

  He drew back, looking down on her, telling himself that he’d be a fool to get mixed up in something that was set against him from the start.

  She was off limits, and it didn’t take an academic genius to figure that one out.

  Except that he had never before let odds stand in his way.

  Sophie waited with bated breath for him to speak again, but he didn’t.

  She wanted nothing more than to forget all that had passed between them. She wanted to start over. Daring to press herself closer, she closed her eyes, hoping he would respond.

  Her body tingled where it met his skin, and she ached to reach out and explore... to smooth her fingers over the muscles of his bare chest.

  “Sophia,” he began, his voice hoarse and low. “May I... kiss you?”

  Her heart hammered at the question.

  She swallowed and whispered back, sounding more hesitant than she wished to, “I would like that.”

  She felt him lean closer, though he didn’t close the space between them. She longed for the feel of his mouth on hers.

  “Are you sure?” he asked again, giving her one last chance to deny him.

  Sophie was quite certain.

  Couldn’t he tell how much she wanted to kiss him by the sound of her heartbeat? It was so loud in her ears that her body thrummed to its rhythm. She nodded and, for answer, lifted her hands from under the blankets, finding his face in the darkness. She touched it tentatively and heard his soft gasp.

  His hand covered hers just an instant before their lips met.

  The shock of it sent Sophie reeling... or maybe it was the boat listing once more. She couldn’t really tell. He held her close, kissing her passionately, but with restraint... and Sophie knew instinctively he was holding back.

  She didn’t want him to.

  He kissed her like a gentleman, not because he was one, she sensed... but because he chose to be one, and that knowledge in itself left her breathless and excited in a way she had never experienced before.

  His kiss was nothing like the chaste pecks on the lips Harlan had given her.

  He cradled her face in his hands, pleading with her. “Open for me, Sophia.”

  For an instant, Sophie didn’t understand what it was he was asking. She was delirious. She closed her eyes and saw tiny points of light bursting before her lids.

  Capturing her hands once again, he drew them behind her head and shifted so that he was atop her, pinning her beneath his weight.

  There was no escape.

  The very thought of it made her body ache in places she had never even known existed.

  “Give me your tongue,” he whispered against her ear. “Let me taste you, Sophia.”

  Sophie shuddered in anticipation of his request. She parted her lips as he wished, and the first foray of his tongue sent her heart fluttering out of her breast. Like a wanton, she clung to him. In response, he deepened the kiss. He held her hands behind her head and moved atop her with such delicious slowness that her body instinctively sought him. She arched into him, trying to free her hands, to hold him, but he held them fast, refusing to free her.

  “Just as I remembered,” he murmured, and Sophie had no notion what he was talking about, only that it gave her a heady rush to hear him say so.

  “Kiss me back,” she heard him beg her, and Sophie tried to obey. She had never kissed a man with openmouthed abandon before. Tentatively, she offered him her tongue, and nearly fainted where she lay when he took it to suckle gently within his mouth.

  She whimpered softly beneath him, writhing in pleasure, urging him deeper into her mouth.

  She wanted more ... wanted him to show her more ...

  Jack groaned with satisfaction over the taste of her. Brief as their first kiss had been, he’d remembered exactly. The taste of her had taunted him since, and like a man starved for sustenance, he craved her.

  His hands needed to roam her body, to touch her, feel her... make love to her, but he restrained them, knowing she hadn’t given him leave to explore.

  But he wanted to—God, he wanted to!

  He held her hands behind her head, because if she touched him... if she so much as urged him to... unwittingly even... he would give it to her gladly.

  He broke free of the kiss, before he could be tempted further... before his hands could slide down over her beautiful body to lift the hem of her flimsy gown. If he did that... if he dared to... she would need far better armor than what she was wearing.

  He stared down at her, very aware of his arousal nestled between them. His body ached. Did she have any idea what he wanted from her?

  More than anything, he wanted to be inside her.

  She was so beautiful.

  Though he couldn’t see her, he imagined her lying beneath him, her rich auburn hair spread like molten copper about her perfect face. And those eyes ... golden like honey, and sprinkled with emerald dust. He cursed the darkness in that instant that he couldn’t see them ... that he couldn’t read her expression.

  Did she regret it already?

  He surely didn’t.

  Couldn’t.

  Wouldn’t.

  She was silent, and Jack told her, “Do you know how long I’ve wanted to do that, Sophia?”

  She sounded breathless, the same as he did. “How long?” she asked him, and he had to smile at her question.

  As a matter of fact, he didn’t remember a moment when he hadn’t wanted to kiss her, and yet he couldn’t honestly give her the exact instant he’d first realized.

  “Since you first kissed me,” he told her, and knew it was a lie.

  He’d wanted her before then.

  “Oh!” she replied. He wished he could see the color in her cheeks. And then she added, sounding as though she were holding back an embarrassed giggle, “I don’t suppose I should apologize, then?”

  Jack grinned down at her. “Not on your life,” he assured her, and chuckled.

  There was silence between them then, and after a moment she said, “I’m very sorry about your papers, Jack.”

  Jack didn’t want to think about that just now, didn’t want to remember who she was. “It’s all right. I managed to save most of them anyway.”

  “Still... I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to.”

  He wanted to believe she had nothing to do with Penn, other than the obvious. He wanted to believe her when she’d said she missed her fiancé and wanted only to see him... and yet a part of him recoiled at the very possibility... because he wanted her for himself.

  “You don’t really believe I would steal from you, do you?” She sounded hurt by the prospect.

  Reality smacked him in the face.

  She was some other man’s fiancée... engaged to be married to someone other than him.

  On top of that, he wasn’t entirely certain he could trust her. His answe
r was honest when he gave it. “No.”

  He couldn’t believe she would kiss him like that if she could so easily turn around and stab him in the back. And still... she wasn’t being completely honest with him... because no woman in love with someone else could kiss another man like that.

  At least he hoped to hell it was true.

  CHAPTER 19

  “She’s not what you think,’ Kell said, coming up behind him.

  Jack glanced up from his work, annoyed that the only thing Kell ever seemed to have to talk to him about was Sophie. “No?” he asked, though he was beginning to sense it as much himself.

  “No,” Kell answered, and came to sit on the desk. The portrait of Harlan Penn caught his attention and he lifted it up, arching a brow as he inspected it.

  Jack tried hard not to notice the picture, as much as it irked him. In fact, he’d like to send it flying across the room, and would have happily let his desk bum down just to get rid of it. But it belonged to Sophie and so he just ignored it.

  “You know something I don’t?” he asked Kell, sensing it was so. Kell never kept anything from him, but somehow Jack felt this time he was.

  Kell’s reply only provoked him more. “Maybe.”

  Jack studied his friend. “You like her, don’t you?”

  Kell flipped the picture down against his thigh and grinned at him. “Everyone likes her, Jack.”

  Jack knew it was true.

  “Except you, ye rotten bastard!”

  “I like her just fine,” Jack countered, and it was a hell of an understatement. He liked her more than just fine... he liked her too damned much.

  “Do you?” Kell pried.

  Jack sat back in his chair, studying the smug expression on Kell’s face.

  “What is it you’re trying to tell me, Kell?”

  Kell stood again, took another look at the picture, and said, “If you’re too blind to see the truth then you don’t deserve to know.” And then he set the picture down facing Jack and walked away.

  Jack watched him go with narrowed eyes, thinking they had known each other far too long. He sighed deeply and his gaze returned to the portrait of Penn.

  His brows drew together as they focused on the picture, and he reached out to grasp it in his hand.

  “I’ll be damned,” he said, and chuckled.

  The artwork wasn’t his.

  Penn sported two horns on his head and a third on his chin, and his eyes were filled with dollar symbols. The look suited him. Jack shook his head and laughed outright. He glanced at the door and thought about calling Kell back to hound him for whatever information he’d gotten out of her, but he knew Kell well enough to know he wouldn’t give it—not if he’d made up his mind not to, and it seemed he had.

  “I’ll be damned,” he said again, and set the picture down facing him, so that he could enjoy it while he worked. His mood, as he sat again, was much lightened.

  Suddenly he heard the shouts, and he nearly knocked the desk over in his haste to discover the cause of the commotion.

  “I’m perfectly all right,” Sophie assured Randall who was shouting at her to come down, trying to calm him before he managed to rouse Jack. It wasn’t as though it were windy and the seas turbulent. The ocean and sky were both at peace after last night’s storm, and Sophie didn’t see the first reason why she couldn’t manage a simple repair. If a man could do it, she could do it. That much was certain.

  “Miss Vanderwahl,” Randall shouted up at her, “please come down from there!”

  Sophie ignored him, climbing higher up the makeshift ladder. Apparently, through the night, the winds had further rent hole she had inadvertently put in the sails—enough that it was visible from the deck below and she didn’t want the rip to worsen. She would certainly take precautions, but she would not be deterred.

  She wanted to do something nice for Jack.

  They had awakened that morning arm in arm on the floor. He’d held her through the night while the storm had raged, and she’d pretended to sleep on while he’d risen with the bright morning sun, taking care to tuck her in before leaving. He’d brushed the hair from her face... so tenderly that it had made her heart twist with longing.

  “Miss Vanderwahl,” Randall protested, and then was joined by Kell, who thankfully remained quiet while staring up at her as though he thought her mad.

  And perhaps she was, because all she could think about was Jack. Jack, Jack, Jack. What in damnation was wrong with her?

  A crowd began to gather on deck, but Sophie ignored them, determined to be of some use. She had found needle and thread in storage, and by their enormous size she determined they were intended for just such an occasion. She might not know how to repair sailcloth precisely, but she was hardly beyond figuring such things out.

  Once she reached her destination, however, the size of the rip dampened her resolve. From below, it had seemed small enough, but up close, she began to wonder if she would do it any good. Even so, it didn’t hurt to try. She took the rope she had coiled on her arm and tied it first about the masthead, and then about her waist, securing her position, lest she slip and fall. That done, she braced herself to work and removed the needle from her dress. It was already threaded; she had done that before coming up. And if she should need more thread, she had that at the ready.

  All was well until Jack shouted up at her, startling her.

  “Goddammit, Sophia! Get down here!”

  She dropped the needle.

  Sophie peered down at Jack, glaring at him. “Look what you made me do!” she railed at him.

  “Get down here, Sophia!”

  His tone of voice grated on her nerves. “I will not!” Sophie countered. “How dare you use that tone with me!” If he were concerned about her, there were far better ways to show it! At any rate, she was just fine, except that now she had no needle to sew the sails. Irritation welled up inside her.

  “Do you have any idea what the hell you are doing?” he asked her, with the emphasis on the word hell. He set his hands on his hips as he glared up at her. “Or do you make it your duty to run around looking for trouble? In all my blasted days, Sophia Vanderwahl, I have never met a more undisciplined woman!”

  If there had been anyone aboard ship who hadn’t known she’d climbed the masthead, he certainly knew it now.

  Undisciplined, was she?

  Anger surged through her. Were she a man up here, Sophie doubted her efforts would have been viewed quite the same way. A man would have been considered conscientious and constructive.

  Undisciplined, bah!

  “I’m fixing the sails!” she informed him smartly, and tried to look as dignified as she possibly could under his tirade. Everyone was watching. “Not that someone like you would bother to appreciate that,” she railed at him. “Ungrateful man,” she muttered under her breath.

  “I see,” he said. “So that’s what you are doing up there.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you planned to just stitch it up with needle and thread?”

  “Of course,” Sophie responded. “Isn’t that how you fix torn cloth?”

  He was silent a moment in the face of her logic, though his fury was evident in his very stance. And then he said, “I don’t know how the hell you fix that cloth, but any idiot would know not to try to fix it while the wind is ripping through!”

  “It’s not windy!” Sophie argued. Merely a gentle breeze. Nothing that should have hampered her repairs. “You are being ridiculous, Jack.”

  “Sophia,” he continued, sounding harassed now. “If you don’t come down from there, I’m coming up!”

  Sophie bristled at his threat. It made her feel like a wayward child, and not even her mother had given her such abuse. Then again, she’d hardly ever done a single thing for which to be reprimanded, so afraid of her mother she had been.

  She refused to be cowed. She was no five-year-old with a muddy dress to be chastened. She was an adult, and a free-thinking one at that!

&n
bsp; She smiled down at him, a challenge in her tone. “You just do that, Jack MacAuley—and why don’t you bring me the needle you made me drop while you are at it?” All at once, the crew below began to search the deck, as though looking for the needle.

  “Sophia!” Jack shouted.

  “I think it’s there... near Randall,” she instructed him, ignoring his directive. If he wanted her down, he could very well ask, politely. She had no reason to remain now without her needle, but she wasn’t going to bow to his every command.

  Randall dropped to his knees, searching. Sophie doubted he would ever find the needle, and in truth, she had no idea where it had fallen. Jack had startled her so.

  Rude cantankerous man!

  “That’s it!” Jack said, throwing up his hands in obvious disgust of her and practically lunging at the masthead before taking hold of the ladder and climbing it much too agilely. Sophie bit her lip, frowning at him. He couldn’t very well drag her down against her will. It wouldn’t be safe to simply pull her down after him. Instinctively she tightened the knot at her waist, and then just to be certain she tied another and pulled with all her might. She didn’t wish to fall victim to his rash anger.

  “I was only trying to help!” she assured him when he was halfway up. She tested the rope once more, growing more anxious the closer he came.

  “Please don’t help!”

  “I don’t understand why you are so angry!”

  Neither Jack.

  He couldn’t explain the fear that had knotted in his gut the instant he’d spied her up on the masthead.

  The woman was insane!

  No more was he merely concerned that she would sink the boat. If she kept this up, she was going to end up six feet under. Jack was going to have to lock her up to keep her safe from harm!

  He climbed swiftly, thinking only of reaching her, not questioning the inexplicable hysteria he felt inside at the thought of her up there.