Lucky moved down the narrow hallway that led to her bedroom with the long, determined strides of a man on a mission. His focus had been reduced down to one purpose with pinpoint accuracy: show Deanna how much he loved her.
“Lucky,” she whispered his name so softly it barely registered.
He didn’t stop. He wasn’t even sure he’d actually heard his name until she spoke again, the words muffled as she snuggled into his neck, and he froze mid-stride.
“Lucky, I love you.”
“What?” His chest constricted, and he stopped breathing.
He’d probably told Deanna that he loved her at least fifty times this past week. She’d never repeated the sentiment to him. The most he’d gotten was a smile.
Leaning back slightly, she peeked up at him through her thick, dark lashes. As she licked her lips, his body surged with arousal. Her voice was still quiet, but the words were clear as day.
“I love you.”
He let out the breath he’d been holding, and happiness unlike any he’d ever felt, flooded through him. It was more intense than when he’d made The Hammer tap out. It was more intense than anything he’d ever experienced.
“Say it again.” It wasn’t a request. He needed to hear her say those three words again.
The blush he’d grown so fond of rose up her cheeks, and her lips tilted at the corners. “I love you.”
He wanted to cry. He wanted to ask her to say it a million more times. He wanted to ask her to marry him.
Knowing that any one of those responses would’ve overwhelmed her, he went with the one thing he knew would not. “Are you just saying that because I just made you come so hard you saw stars?”
His teasing had the desired effect—her smile grew larger. “I mean, I’m not going to lie. That only helped the case, but no, that’s not why. I love you, Lucky. I don’t know what’s going to happen in the future, but no matter what happens, I wanted you to know that I love you.”
He knew exactly what was going to happen in the future. She was going to be his wife. That’s what was going to happen. Again, knowing that she wasn’t ready for him to let her in on his crystal ball prediction of what was in store for them, he went another route. His feet started moving again as he carried her to her bedroom.
“I know what’s going to happen in the future. You’re going to see more stars.”
She giggled, nuzzling against his neck as he stepped into her room. After crossing the room in two steps, he lowered her down on the bed, and before her head even hit the pillow, he was lifting her dress up and off. When the fabric cleared her hands, he dropped it on the side of the bed and started unbuttoning his shirt.
Deanna pushed herself to the center of the bed. Lying completely naked, she watched as he took his shirt off and unbuckled his belt, her eyes hungrily taking it in. He loved the way she looked at him. It was more than just the lust he’d seen in other women’s eyes. She looked at him like he was some kind of work of art. Like he was a Greek god. Or maybe that was just him projecting, because when he looked at her, he saw a goddess, a masterpiece, a muse that surely would’ve inspired da Vinci, Michelangelo, Picasso, or van Gogh.
After kicking his shoes off and pushing his pants and his boxers down, he moved onto the bed. She opened her legs for him, and he settled between them. Hovering above her, he leaned on his elbows, his forearms framing her face.
Last night, he hadn’t been able to sleep. When she was at the station, it was one thing. That was her job, and it was impossible for him to be with her. But knowing that she had been across town, in this bed, without him, had driven him crazy. He’d tossed and turned.
In the short span of time that he’d known Deanna, she’d become his world. He needed her like he needed food to eat, water to drink, or oxygen to breathe. And she loved him. Nothing else mattered, and he planned on showing her that.
He softly pressed his lips to hers. He took his time lingering there, brushing his lips back and forth across hers. When he pulled her bottom lip between his and sucked, her hips rolled against his and her hands grasped his shoulders. When he deepened the kiss, sliding his tongue between her lips, she moaned and her hands began roaming his back. Her fingers trailed over his shoulders and down his spine.
He lost himself as he explored her mouth in a long, drugging kiss. Their tongues danced and tangled as he absorbed her essence into his very being. Lucky didn’t know if he kissed her for an hour or five minutes. Time stood still as he sank deeper into the haze of bliss her kiss inspired.
Lucky could’ve stayed adrift in the foggy seas of lust forever and not complained. But Deanna’s body writhed beneath him and guided him back to the shores of the here and now like a lighthouse in a storm of passion. Her fingers tightened around his biceps as he swallowed her soft, needy sounds in their mind-blowing kiss.
His shaft was nestled between her slick folds, and every time she moved her hips, his steel hard shaft slid up and down her sex. He could feel her body straining for another release, and if she kept it up, she was going to accomplish just that, not only for herself, but he was scared she would take him with her.
Knowing he needed to slow things down if he wanted a chance of lasting more than another minute, Lucky broke their kiss. Then her hands moved to his face and she tried to pull him down. As much as he wanted to give in to her persuasive move, he couldn’t. Not unless he wanted this encounter to be over before it had even started.
Upon shifting his weight to one arm, he captured her slender wrists with one hand and raised them above her head. The action caused her chest to arch up, and the sight of her breasts being offered up to him was more than he could resist. Keeping her hands pinned in place, Lucky lowered his head and covered her nipple with his mouth.
“Oh!” she gasped, and her hips bucked.
Using his tongue, he flicked her hardened nipple as he sucked her breast farther into the wet heat of his mouth. Then he swirled his tongue in a suctioning motion before biting the beaded knot of her flesh. His was flooded with arousal as he alternated sucking, licking, and nipping each of her pebble-hard tips.
Her arms pulled against his hold, but he tightened his grip. Tonight, he needed to have total control. She’d told him that she loved him, and she wouldn’t have said that unless she trusted him.
He continued lavishing attention on both breasts. Sucking. Licking. Kissing. Biting.
“Lucky, please,” she begged as her hips tilted into his.
The raw and primal need in her pleading words shot straight to his groin. Straightening up, he lifted his body, using the leverage from the hand holding her wrists in place. His other hand moved between their bodies. Then he wrapped his hand around his painfully hard, throbbing length, and positioned his engorged tip at her opening.
His jaw tensed as he watched himself slide into her, inch by inch. Beads of sweat rose on his back as he slowly sank into her tight, wet passage. When he finally filled her to the hilt, he gripped her hips and pulled back out.
“Oh…you feel so…good,” she moaned as he drove into her again and again in measured strokes.
He held her hip in place and quickly found the rhythm that caused her inner thighs to tremble against his hips.
“Yes…yes…yes!” she cried in fevered exclamations as her arms strained against his hold.
Knowing she was close only made him tighten his iron grip. When he did, a rush of liquid heat coated his throbbing dick as her inner walls contracted around him as she came.
The sensation triggered one of the most powerfully erotic releases of his life. Lightning bolts of fulfillment flashed through him. He continued to pump in and out as his climax slammed into him. When her arms went limp, he groaned in male satisfaction and thrust one last time in the final moment of his mind-blowing release.
Even as aftershocks rioted through him, he collapsed beside her on his back and pulled her on top of him. She laid her head on his chest as his heart pounded against her cheek. He held her in his arms, his
hands running up and down her bare back as they both caught their breath.
“I love you,” he whispered against her hair as he kissed the top of her head.
“I love you, too,” she said sweetly then lifted her head so her chin was resting on his chest, her mouth turned up into a smile. “And not because you just made me see stars again. Well, not just because you made me see stars again.”
He playfully swatted her bare ass, and she laughed, but he saw the way her eyes lit up at the contact. There was so much more he had to discover about her. He wanted to know how to push all of her erotically-charged buttons. He wanted to know what turned her on. He wanted to make her see stars every day and night for the rest of her life.
Chapter 24
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A loud buzzing caused Deanna to sit straight up in a start. She blinked several times, trying to get her bearings. The room was dark, but she was in her bed. The right side of her body was hot, and she looked over and found Lucky lying beside her.
The buzzing sounded again, so she reached over on the nightstand for her phone. When she didn’t find it, she reached down on the floor for her purse. Lucky had dropped it on the floor before he’d laid her in bed.
As she patted the floor in search for her bag, her hand landed on the phone. Bingo. It must’ve fallen out onto the floor.
Her eyes squinted at the bright screen. It was a text, and she tapped on it.
JUST GOT SENT THIS STORY.
There was a link to an online gossip site. Deanna kept reading.
THEY ARE RUNNING IT AND ASKING FOR A COMMENT…
SERIOUSLY!?
A THREESOME AT YOUR COUSIN’S BACHELOR PARTY! WHAT HAPPENED TO THE BASEBALL PLAYER’S DAUGHTER? I THOUGHT WE AGREED THAT YOU WERE GOING TO CLEAN UP YOUR IMAGE FOR SPONSORS AND SHE WAS A PIVOTAL PART OF PUTTING YOUR BAD BOY DAYS BEHIND YOU.
CALL ME WHEN YOU GET THIS.
Deanna’s stomach rolled as she clicked on the link. She didn’t read it, just saw several pictures of Lucky posing with two girls and then a bra and a pair of underwear with his signature.
Then there was another buzz. This one wasn’t coming from Lucky’s phone. After climbing off the bed, she bent down, retrieved her purse in the dark, and removed her phone. It was from the station. There was a multi-unit structural fire out on the highway and she was being called in.
As much as she wanted to ignore the message, wake Lucky up, and yell, scream, maybe even throw something at him, that wasn’t an option. She silently opened her dresser and grabbed jeans, a shirt, socks, and underwear. Then she tiptoed into the bathroom to get dressed.
If Lucky woke up, she wouldn’t be able to act normal. So the best thing she could do was get out of her house and leave him sleeping there. Her legs and arms were clumsy as she hurriedly dressed.
Tears threatened to fall, but she held herself together. Once she’d put her hair up in a ponytail, she brushed her teeth, and she was ready to go in under three minutes. After stepping into her tennis shoes, she slipped out of her bedroom and her house undetected.
Her heart was racing and adrenaline was pumping through her as she got into her car and drove towards the station in the early hours of the morning. The sky was dark but full of stars.
“Stars,” she whispered.
Then the tears started falling. She couldn’t help it. The more she tried to stop them, the harder she cried.
How could she have been so stupid? This was her mom and the photo shoot, her dad and the summer, her first boyfriend and his plan all over again. She was being used by someone she loved, who claimed to love her.
Her mind was spinning as she went over every minute she and Lucky had spent together.
Had this been his plan from the beginning?
“No,” she said to herself.
There was no way he could have planned their meeting. She had run into him. Literally.
So when? When had it been? Before the auction? At the auction?
Or after the hospital when the press had shown up?
Her stomach and her heart both clenched at a sickening thought. Had he been the one to tip off the press?
“No,” she repeated.
He wouldn’t do that… Would he? Everything in her was saying no, he would never do that. Everything in her was saying that there had to be some mistake. That Jessie’s text was wrong. That Lucky loved her.
But that was stupid. Facts were facts.
Oh no!
She was turning into one of those women she’d always felt sorry for, like her mother, who made excuses for the behavior of the men they loved. Deanna remembered how many times her mother would excuse her father’s behavior. She’d blame his career, the other women, even his friends, but it was never her Doug Bishop’s fault when he didn’t do what he’d said he was going to do. Be where he’d said he was going to be. Or when he showed up on the cover of gossip magazines with the flavor of the week after having promised her mother he was only with her.
She knew that love made people blind and, most of the time, stupid, but she’d honestly, always, truly believed that her mother had known the truth, deep down, and she was just in denial.
Now, she was starting to think she might’ve been wrong. Because, logically, Deanna knew she’d seen a picture of Lucky and two girls and his signature on their bra and panties. Logically, she knew that those girls were claiming to have had a threesome with him. Logically, she knew that Jessie’s text had said that the alleged threesome had occurred at Adam’s bachelor party. But, deep down, she didn’t believe that any of it was true.
Deanna’s hands gripped the steering wheel as she tried to remember what she’d felt when she’d found out about her parents and her boyfriend. She searched her memory and came up with the same answer for all three situations. She hadn’t been surprised at all.
Not one bit.
When the truth had come to light, there was no denial, no questioning how they could have done it. All she’d felt was disappointment and a little hurt. But not shock. It didn’t matter that she’d loved all three of them. When she’d found out their true motivations, it had just made sense.
But this didn’t.
So, what was different this time?
Was it because she loved Lucky so much deeper? Was it her pride that was hurt? Was it because she’d actually let her guard down?
As she turned onto Main Street, she knew she only had a few blocks to get herself together. She had a job to do, and it didn’t matter that it felt like her world had just imploded.
She tried to give herself a pep talk.
So what if Lucky had cheated on her? She wasn’t the first person to get cheated on, and she wouldn’t be the last.
As soon as the words played in her mind, she realized something. Yes, Lucky had told her that he loved her, and yes, they were sleeping together. But they’d never discussed whether or not they were exclusive.
So, technically, even if this had happened, he hadn’t done anything wrong. You can’t cheat on someone you’re not in a committed relationship with.
Why didn’t that information make her feel any better?
Because the truth was, if this were true, he’d just been using her. He didn’t love her, and everything they’d shared had been a lie. And if that were true, she wasn’t sure she would recover.
Turning the wheel, she pulled into the parking lot beside the fire station. Chris drove up behind her, and Casey’s truck was already there. Seeing the guys, being at her station, she felt a sense of belonging and strength she’d never experienced before.
She had a career she loved, lived in a town she loved, and worked side by side with men she was proud to call brothers.
This was her life. These people were her family. Not Lucky. He’d just been a momentary distraction.
Chapter 25
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While forcing her heavy lids open, Deanna was temporarily blinded by a bright light. Squinting, she tried to sit up but was unable to do so. Her head was pounding, and
her entire body ached. She tried to open her eyes again, and this time, a figure came into focus, but it was too blurry to make out their identity.
“Deanna.” A familiar male voice cut through the fogginess that had settled in her brain. “She’s awake. Call the nurse.”
She was vaguely aware of muffled voices around her. Nothing was clear though. All she could see were bleary shapes. After blinking several times and her vision had cleared, she saw Lucky standing over her. He looked tired. Sexy but tired. And worried.
When he brushed a strand of hair off her forehead, something familiar flooded her. His touch felt so good. So safe.
“Hi.” Her attempt at speaking came out as a hoarse croak.
“Hi, Pop-Tart.” Lucky’s easy smile didn’t match the concern etched around his eyes. “Don’t try to talk. Just relax.”
She was about to tell him that he was bossy when a flurry of activity started happening around her. Lucky was gone. Her eyelids were being forced open as an even brighter light shined in first her left then right eye. A woman was asking her questions. What was her name? What year was it? Who was the president? How old was she?
Deanna answered each question, but then she had a few of her own. Where was she? What had happened?
As the nurse told her that she was in the hospital in Sacramento, Deanna listened, trying to puzzle out the situation. She’d been flown by helicopter after the roof had collapsed in the structural fire she and her unit had been fighting. As they spoke, things starting coming back to her in pieces. They’d shown up on scene and had to clear the abandoned apartment building that was a known hangout for squatters. She and Casey had made it up to the second floor. Over the radio, they’d been told to get out. That’s the last thing she remembered.
“How’s Casey? Casey Palmer?” she asked, her voice scratchy.
“He’s in stable condition,” the no-nonsense doctor explained bluntly, as if that had answered all of her questions.
Lucky Kiss Page 25
