Angie sucked in her breath at the pure masculine beauty of him. She’d seen him naked before, of course. That wasn’t what affected her. Or at least, it wasn’t the primary thing. No, what made her knees weak and her breath catch, what brought a liquid rush of desire to her sex was the unmistakable, gorgeous evidence of his arousal. Of what she miraculously, inexplicably did to him.
She had never considered the penis to be a particularly aesthetic element of the male anatomy, but Cade’s cock—long and thick and as perfectly proportioned as the rest of him— forced her to revise her opinion. There was nothing about the man that wasn’t beautiful. It was as simple as that.
And he wanted her. Incredible, but true.
“Your turn,” he said gently, his eyes boring into her with the heated intensity of a laser beam.
“My turn…?” Then she remembered she was still wearing her blouse and bra. “Oh.”
Their gazes locked as, one by one, she undid the buttons, slowly because her fingers were trembling, and then shrugged the blouse from her shoulders. When she was done, she turned her back to him. He read her request immediately, his warm fingers making short work of the clasp of her bra. As soon as that last scrap of fabric between them was gone, he slid his arms around her and cupped her breasts in his palms.
“Beautiful,” he murmured in her ear as he kneaded her flesh, his thumb and fingers tugging rhythmically at her nipples.
“I could say the same about you.” She leaned back into him, trapping his cock between her ass cheeks and his abdomen.
He made a guttural sound in his throat as she rolled her hips from side to side. “You’re making it very difficult for me to do a better job this time around.”
“I told you,” she said, twisting in his arms to face him, “I’m not sure it’s possible to do better.”
His eyes narrowed, and his mouth drew into a feral line. “Them’s fighting words, Miss Peterson,” he drawled, deliberately laying a thick Texas accent over the top of his Minnesota vowels.
She twined her arms around his neck. “Then let’s get to the fighting, Mr. Reynolds.”
Before she knew how it happened, she was on her back on the bed, the length of Cade’s body stretched out over hers. “I aim to please,” he said with a grin.
And please her, he did. His hands and mouth were magic, finding erogenous zones she’d never even known existed—the tips of her fingers, the edges of her rib cage, the backs of her knees. He teased her nipples to tender, aching points with his teeth and tongue before settling between her legs and bringing her to a swift, sweet climax with that very same, incredibly talented tongue.
When he was finished, he donned a condom, then shifted her onto her side, facing away from him, and slid into her from behind. The sensation of him filling her from this angle was so exquisite, it was almost painful. As he moved inside her, he pressed his fingers to her clit, making slow, dancing circles over the tender bit of flesh until she was frantic to come again.
“Jesus, Cade,” she whimpered. She’d always thought the G-spot was a myth, but she was pretty sure he’d found hers.
“I’ll take that as a compliment.” He was trying to sound casual, but his voice was as strained as hers.
She shattered a few seconds later, the orgasm pouring through her like a monsoon, wet and hot and wonderful. His mouth captured hers as he stiffened and came with her, the pulsing of his cock as palpable as the beating of her own heart.
He lifted his head and grinned down at her. “Now, be honest with me. That was better, wasn’t it?”
Angie twisted to face him and dragged a finger down the center of his chest. “I’m not sure. I might need another demonstration before I can make up my mind.”
Grabbing her hand, he brought it to his mouth and kissed her palm. “I think that can be arranged. Very soon.”
Chapter Twelve
The phone was ringing.
Barely conscious, Cade flung his arm out to answer it, knocking the receiver off the hook before he realized the sound wasn’t coming from the hotel phone. The ring tone was too tinny and too distant.
A cell phone, he thought. And not his.
Memory rushed in, along with a heady dose of the scent of sex and the soft warmth of Angie’s body spooned against his.
She was still here.
He jostled her shoulder gently to rouse her. The room was dark and a quick glance at the bedside clock verified it was coming up on three a.m.
“Angie, your phone.”
“My what?” she mumbled, snuggling back toward him so that his half-erect cock seated itself in the crack of her ass.
He grimaced as he came to near-instant attention. Apparently, three times in one night hadn’t been enough for him. He wasn’t sure three hundred times would be, either.
“Your phone. It’s ringing.”
That, combined with the next jangling sound, was enough to rouse her. She struggled up onto her elbows and glanced over him at the clock.
“Oh, shit.” She threw off the sheet—with their combined body heat, they hadn’t needed a blanket—and pitched her legs off the bed.
Cade smiled in the darkness. He’d only heard her curse once before. As a high school teacher, he supposed an ability to avoid using profanity was a practical necessity.
“What’s the problem?”
“My dad. I never called to tell him I wouldn’t be home tonight.” She pushed off the bed and headed toward the suite’s living area, where her handbag was probably somewhere on the floor near the door. The motion-sensitive nightlight in the hallway clicked on, bathing the elegant curve of her back in a dim, golden glow before she disappeared around the corner.
The cell jingled again, and she muttered something indistinguishable. This was followed by one more ring and the muted clank of car keys.
“Hello.”
That was the last thing he heard before she appeared in the hallway again. Her front side looked even better in the soft light than her back did, and her back had looked pretty damned terrific.
She gestured with the phone as she walked back into the bedroom. “I just missed it.
Rolled to voice mail.”
“Was it your father?” he asked.
With a morose nod, she sat down on the bed beside him and stared at the phone. “He wanted to know if Jake is okay and to make sure I’m all right after what happened. He knew I’d blame myself. I’m going to have to call him back.” She sounded as though she considered the idea about as appealing as walking on hot coals.
Cade reached over to switch on the light before the motion sensitive ones went out, then pushed himself to a sitting position and tucked the pillows behind his back. “Why is that a problem?”
She rolled her eyes. “He’s my father. Can’t you guess?”
“Hey, you’re a grown woman, not a teenager. This can’t be the first time—” He broke off when she gave him a biting look.
Oh. Well, that was interesting. And more than a little flattering.
“I should get dressed and go home.” She sighed.
“Oh no, you shouldn’t. You promised me the whole weekend.”
“That was before I considered the implications of telling my father where I’ll be spending the next two nights.”
Cade frowned, trying to square the Daryl Peterson he met last Saturday with a man who’d have issues with his adult daughter’s sexuality. Granted, Peterson was of a different era, but he’d fully embraced Angie’s decidedly non-traditional career choice. It was difficult to imagine him going medieval over her spending a weekend with a man.
“Why do you still live at home, anyway?” Cade asked. The question had been niggling at him since he’d stopped by the house with the playbook over a week ago. “Surely being a teacher pays well enough for you to afford your own place.”
She looked away, her mouth pulling into a frown. “After my mother died, he was just so lost. I couldn’t leave him alone; I was afraid he’d die, too. Since then, I just haven’t found
a good reason to move out. I have my own space upstairs, so it’s almost like having my own apartment, and this way, I can be sure he’s okay. Losing my mom like that was awful. I’m not ready to go through it again.”
“You don’t really think he’s going to think less of you if you have a relationship, though, do you?”
Angie laughed mirthlessly. “You don’t get it. He’s been after me to ‘have a relationship,’ as you put it, for the last two years. He won’t be upset. He’ll be thrilled. And worse, he’ll have…expectations.”
“Is that why you don’t date?” Cade asked. It still baffled him that a woman as smart and gorgeous as Angie was not only unmarried but not even seeing anyone. She ought to have men stacked up at her door ten deep. Not that he was complaining.
“I date,” she contradicted. “Just not very much.”
She stooped down to pick up something off the floor—her blouse, he realized—and slipped her arms into the sleeves, clutching it closed over her breasts before sitting on the bed beside him. He resisted the urge to pry the fabric from her hands. As much as he loved to keep looking at her luscious naked body, doing so wasn’t exactly conducive to conversation.
“Okay,” he amended. “Why don’t you date very much?”
“Well, it’s not like there are a lot of opportunities in Harper Falls. This is a place people move to when they’re married to raise their families, not a place people live when they’re single and looking. Almost everyone we went to high school with has moved to the Cities or even farther away. And the ones who are left…” She shuddered and shook her head. “Besides, even if I did have opportunities, it’s weird to date someone who lives in the same town when you’re a high school teacher. Especially a town as small as this. Everyone knows everyone’s business.
Nothing’s private.”
Cade nodded. He understood what it was like not to have a private life. As a celebrity, he hadn’t had one until he’d dropped off the map after his injury. Every date he’d been on in the previous fifteen years was a matter of public record. In fact, ironically, it was only since he’d gotten back to Harper Falls that he’d been to bed with a woman without it making the gossip columns. At least, it hadn’t yet.
But it was different for Angie. She wasn’t a celebrity, and she had a certain reputation to maintain. He’d have to be careful not to compromise her standing in the community. Which meant he’d better fish or cut bait.
“Well,” he said, “I can’t say I’m sorry the pickings here are slim.” Leaning over, he nuzzled her neck. “It gives me a fighting chance.”
She let out a sigh that was half surrender, half exasperation. “You always had more than a fighting chance. But you need to stop that before I forget to call my dad back. He’s probably worried sick.”
Cade straightened up. “As long as you promise you’re not going to go running home at the sound of his voice.”
With a grin, she stood up. “I promise. But don’t be surprised if the next time you see him, he’s calling you ‘Son’ and asking when you’re going to make an honest woman out of me.”
As she walked back into the living room, the sweetly rounded cheeks of her ass peeking out beneath the hem of her blouse, Cade decided that was a risk he was more than willing to take.
***
“Love you, too. ’Bye, Dad.” Angie pressed the end button on her cell, completing the most uncomfortable conversation she’d ever had.
It was silly, of course. She was twenty-nine, not eighteen. But still…there was something about telling her father she was spending the weekend with Cade Reynolds—and knowing her dad knew exactly what they were doing together—that made her want to crawl into a hole and die. Her father wouldn’t think less of her; she knew that. But she hated that when this whole thing came to a crashing halt, his heart would be as broken as hers, because she would never date anyone he’d like as much as he liked Cade.
“All taken care of?” Cade asked when she came back into the bedroom.
She’d half hoped he might have fallen back asleep while she was gone, because she really didn’t want to talk any more about her lack of a sex life. Compared to Cade, she felt gauche and inexperienced, as if she’d been transported by time machine back to the ninth grade, and she wasn’t at all sure he wasn’t starting to feel the same way. Like maybe she’d read too much into the fact that they were spending the weekend together and he thought she was expecting a marriage proposal to be right around the corner.
Nodding, she crawled back into the bed. While she’d been in the living room, she’d buttoned up her blouse and found her panties, which she’d put back on.
He raised an eyebrow. “Unusual choice in pajamas.”
Unable to think of a smart retort, she shrugged. “Just making do with what I have.”
“We’ll stop by your place tomorrow and pick up something else for you to wear. In the meantime,” he said, cupping her cheek in his palm, “I’d really prefer it if you weren’t wearing anything.”
“I don’t—” Angie began, but it was already too late to object that it was the middle of the night and surely he couldn’t want to have sex again, because he was kissing her and unbuttoning her blouse at the same time, and there was absolutely no doubt whatsoever that he did want to have sex again.
And unbelievably, so did she. Her nipples came to instant attention, and her panties grew damp as he slid his hand down her torso to her abdomen. She gasped as his fingers found the waistband of her panties and then pulled them down to her thighs.
He broke the kiss, shifting their bodies so they lay on their sides, facing each other. His eyes were dark and heavy-lidded. “The whole time you were in there talking on the phone, all I could think about was getting you back in here and fucking your brains out. And then you come in here all dressed and prim. I’m feeling downright barbaric.”
Her clit pulsed with need at his coarse language. She wriggled her hips. “I’m feeling a little barbaric myself.”
“Good,” he said, grinning. “Take off the panties then, Barbarella.”
She giggled at the reference as she lifted her legs and slipped the underwear down over her knees, then kicked them off the end of the bed.
“Better. Now, let’s try this…roll over onto your stomach.”
Her breath hitched as she wondered what he had in mind, but she did as he asked. He straddled her legs at the knees and then began massaging his way down her back to her butt and thighs. She closed her eyes and moaned as he turned her into warm butter. By the time his fingers delved between her cheeks and the swollen flesh between her legs, she was too relaxed and too aroused to object to anything he might do. In fact, she lifted her hips and spread her legs to assist him.
He made her come once, almost right away, his thumb pressing her rhythmically as his fingers moved inside her. She was still weak and panting when he leaned over and grabbed a condom packet from the bedside table. After rolling it on, he grasped her waist, angled her hips slightly upward, and buried his cock inside her. Muffling a moan into the pillow, she arched her back, deepening their connection. He groaned and kissed the sensitive spot beneath her ear.
“Make yourself come again,” he ordered, grabbing her hand, which was resting beside her head, and guiding it down between her legs.
Her face flamed. Could she do that? But as he pressed his fingers over hers, showing her what he wanted her to do, she found she not only could do that, she liked it. He moved his hand away, sliding them up to cup her breasts and tease her nipples while he fucked her with slow, deep strokes that seemed to reach all the way up to her heart.
When she came again, he turned her head to capture her mouth in a kiss and came right along with her.
Afterward, as they pulled apart and settled back beneath the sheet again, spoon-fashion, he muttered, “You can get clothes tomorrow. But you won’t be needing pajamas.”
Chapter Thirteen
This time, it was Cade’s cell phone that was ringing. Or playing Pink Flo
yd, as the case might be.
Even groggier than he’d been at three a.m., he rolled over and found his cell, grimacing as he noted the time. Six thirty. On a Saturday morning. Was Stu insane?
He glanced at Angie and smiled. Still sound asleep. He’d worn her clean out.
Clicking the talk button, he put the receiver to his ear. “This better be good,” he said, his voice hoarse with sleep.
“It is!” Stu was plainly both wide awake—although Cade was pretty sure his agent normally didn’t rise much before noon—and very excited. “The Jets want to see you today. They heard the Vikings are in talks with the Texans for you and they want a shot. Meadowlands, three o’clock this afternoon. I’ve got a seat for you on the nine thirty flight out of Minneapolis up on the computer screen right now. You’ll hit the tarmac at one thirty in Newark, which should give you just enough time to get to—”
“Wait just a goddamn minute,” Cade interrupted. “I didn’t even know the Vikings were still interested.” It had been almost three weeks since his audition. He’d assumed that deal wasn’t going to happen.
“I didn’t want to mention it because your GM is driving a hard bargain. He wants more in the trade for you than the Vikes really want to give.”
Cade rubbed his eyes, trying to get his head around what his agent was telling him. It was too damn early in the morning for this much information. “And the Jets want to see me today?”
“Isn’t it great? It’s the break you’ve been waiting for. They’re ready to can Maddox, and they want you for the job. For good.”
Cade allowed himself a full second of exhilaration before he let skepticism take over.
“Me and who else?”
“No one. They swore to me it’s you unless you reject their offer.”
Angie shifted and stirred beside him. His heart skipped a beat as the sheet slipped to her waist, baring one gorgeous pink-tipped breast. He couldn’t just up and go to New York at the drop of a hat. Not today. Not when he’d finally gotten Angie back in his bed where she belonged.
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