Breaking the kiss, she shoved up his shirt, lowered her face and pressed her lips to his skin.
“You make me feel like I’m sixteen,” he said with a ragged breath.
“You definitely don’t feel like a sixteen-year-old to me,” she replied, her smile evident in her voice, her tongue against his chest, tasting salt and man.
She had turned on the wide bench seat so that she faced him, practically sitting in his lap, and he ran his left hand up her thigh beneath the cuff of her shorts and around the back, savoring her delicate skin, touching the curve of her buttocks. Her shorts were too tight for him to reach higher, preventing a more intimate exploration, and making her wish, shamefully that she’d worn a skirt.
He grasped her backside through the fabric and caressed her in maddeningly gentle strokes.
“I can’t take any more of this,” he rasped against her ear. “Let’s cool off.”
“Then let me…” she said, reaching for the button on his jeans.
“No.” He grabbed her wrist.
“Nick—”
“No. Not here. Not like this.” He released her and threw open the door, jumping out of the car like it was on fire.
And maybe it was. He sure as hell was.
Facing away from her, he leaned against the fender for a good five minutes.
Ryanne closed her eyes. Unfamiliar sensations hummed through her body like liquid fire. Nick depicted every erotic fantasy she’d ever had. He made her feel like Eve, like Jezebel, like a seductress…and she liked the feeling. She felt so sexy with him she couldn’t stand it. Everything about him set her aflame. Why had she never seen it—felt it—before?
And the fact that he wanted her as badly as she wanted him was a heady aphrodisiac. And he did. She knew it without a doubt, even if he wasn’t ready to admit it yet.
Nick resorted to the sleeping pills that night—just mild ones that took the edge off and let him get enough rest so that he could function the next day. The situation was taking a toll on his mind and body. Ryanne was only here temporarily, and he wasn’t convinced that their friendship could handle a brief fling.
However, fighting against his desire for her was obviously killing brain cells. The following morning, he snapped at Bryce twice and had to apologize. He ordered a carryout lunch at the Waggin’ Tongue and forgot the bag on the counter. When Shirley Rumford called to him as he was getting back in the cruiser, he’d taken one look at the bag the café owner held and felt like an idiot.
“You okay, hon?” she’d asked.
“I’m fine.”
“Maybe you need a little time off.”
“I have a vacation coming up,” he assured her.
He took his meal to the dock along the river where he used to fish, and listened for calls over the radio as he ate and had his allotted worry time. He hadn’t slept well in years, but nights were worse than ever now. He was going to have to snap out of this. His mind had careened into a rut and he couldn’t direct his thoughts back onto the road toward sanity.
They’d bet an entire week of midnight drives. It wasn’t as if he’d have been sleeping anyway, but the sexual frustration was enough to make a man crack. Could he renege on the bet? Did he want to? God help him, no. He wanted to do exactly what they were doing. And more.
A little before 11:00 p.m. that night he called her. He’d been keeping an eye out for her lights and knew she was still downstairs. “You awake?” he asked.
“Oh, yes. It doesn’t cool off enough to sleep upstairs until around one.”
“Why don’t you run the air?”
“It doesn’t work that well when it’s this hot.”
“Why don’t you call Nate Keenan at the hardware store? He has a repairman.”
“Maybe I will.”
“Are we still on?” Nick asked, thinking she might have changed her mind after she’d had time to cool off and reconsider.
“Unless you need to sleep,” she said. “This wasn’t very fair of me, because I know you have to go to work in the morning.”
“I’m a night owl,” he assured her. “Want to leave now?”
“I’ll meet you in back. We’re taking my car, right?”
“You said I could drive it.”
“You’re on.”
Ryanne hung up and checked her hair in the mirror on the dining room wall. She ran a hand over her cotton top and the gauzy calf-length skirt, then picked up her purse and keys.
She could feel his appreciative gaze, even in the darkness, as she walked toward him, and she returned the admiration, taking in his long legs in faded jeans, his broad chest and ample shoulders in a gray T-shirt. Nick took the keys and unlocked the garage, spreading the aged wooden doors to each side and walking to the driver’s side of her red Viper.
Ryanne opened the passenger door and got in herself—this wasn’t a date, after all. She buckled her seat belt as Nick started the powerful engine and found the switch for the headlights.
She could smell him. Sandalwood and midnight air. She knew how his skin tasted. She knew the effect of his kisses on her head and her body. She knew how dangerous this game had become, but she didn’t want to concede or even call for a time out. She wanted more.
Nick adjusted the driver’s seat for his longer legs, tested the sensitive clutch and backed out of the drive, heading for the highway. The sound of the engine always gave her goose bumps, and from the look on Nick’s face, he was experiencing the same reaction.
He gave her a sideways glance. “A hundred seventy-eight, you said?”
“That was in the middle of nowhere,” she replied. “Don’t even think about it.”
“There’s a straight four-mile stretch between the water tower here and the Cooperton Bridge,” he said.
“You’re the sheriff.”
“Right. So, who’s going to give me a ticket?”
“Not over a hundred,” she warned him.
He downshifted and stepped on the accelerator. Two minutes and a near cardiac arrest later, he slowed to the speed limit. Glancing at her face, he laughed. “What? You’ve driven it faster.”
“It’s different when you’re the one driving,” she told him.
“What are you doing with a car like this, anyway?”
“What do you mean?”
“I’d expect you to drive a Lexus or a Beemer or something.”
She didn’t have time to reply, because a beeping sound interrupted.
Her first instinct was to reach for her pager, but she hadn’t worn it in weeks. Nick flipped up the hem of his T-shirt and snagged the tiny phone from his waistband. “Sinclair… How long ago?” There was a longer pause. “No, I’m only about ten minutes away. Tell him to sit tight and I’ll get it.”
He broke the connection, and Ryanne waited to hear what was going on.
“I need to stop by the Clement place. Harold Clement thinks someone shot at his house.”
“Oh my God, a drive-by shooting in Elmwood?”
“We don’t have any gangs or anything. But this isn’t the first time this has happened. I suspect someone has a grudge against Harold, for whatever reason. Probably just a kid with a rock, but I haven’t found any proof. I’ll drop you off at home.”
“As long as you think it’s safe, I don’t mind riding along. It’ll save you time.”
“That it will.”
He drove back to town and cruised up the street where the Clement house sat. Several neighbors in varying stages of dress, from robes and slippers to sweats and bare feet, stood on Harold’s lawn. Most of them turned to stare when the Viper roared to a vibrating stop at the curb.
Ryanne exchanged a look with Nick as he reached for the door. Gossip would zing along the telephone wires and at the grocery checkouts tomorrow.
Nick got out and strode toward Harold.
Ryanne leaned out the window Nick had rolled down before turning off the engine.
“Look at this, Nick,” Harold said. The fifty-something pharmacist wore a pl
aid robe belted around his wide belly, plus white socks and slippers. What little hair he had stood on end. “Someone was shooting at our place again.”
Nick studied the broken glass from the faux gas lamp that stood in their front yard. “Did you hear a shot? Could it have been a rock?”
“I heard it,” Harold assured him. “Popped like a gun.”
“Were there any cars? Did you see anyone drive away?”
“I looked out soon as I heard the sound.” Ryanne recognized the young woman who spoke; she worked in the post office. Her name badge had read Larken.
Nick turned to the woman. “You heard it, too?”
She nodded. “I was letting my dog out.”
“Did you see a car?”
“No. Nothing.”
“Anyone on foot?”
She shook her head. “It was too dark and the light was behind me, from my doorway.”
“A person thinks they’re safe in a little town like this,” Harold grumbled. “Then they get shot at. I just got this lamp fixed after the last time, too. Cost me forty-five bucks for the glass panels and the bulbs.”
“Maybe the bulb just burst,” Nick suggested.
“It was a shot,” Harold insisted. “I know a gunshot when I hear one.”
“Well, just like last time, everybody in the neighborhood has trampled the area. If there was evidence, it’s gone now,” Nick told the bystanders, waving them away. “Back up, people. I’ll come out first thing in the morning and look over the ground.”
On her way back to her house, Larken gave Ryanne a little wave. The others headed to their homes, mumbling and giving Ryanne and her car inquisitive looks.
Nick walked Harold up to his porch and spoke with him briefly before returning to the Viper.
“Sorry about interrupting our drive.” Starting the engine, he turned on the headlights.
“No problem. That kind of thing happen often?”
“Always something.” He glanced in the rearview mirror and pulled onto the street.
“Tired yet?” he asked her once they were out on the highway.
Ryanne assured him she wasn’t. Alone in this car with Nick, she was more awake than she’d ever been, her senses more acute, her nerve endings tingling.
He took a rutted side road, the headlights illuminating trees and the silver-red reflection of small animals’ eyes along what soon became almost a dirt trail. “If I get your car dirty, I’ll wash it.”
She hadn’t even been thinking of that. She’d been wondering where he was headed down this deserted road into darkness, and her heart had started to pound with anticipation. He knew where he was going, and eventually stopped the Viper, turning off the engine.
He switched off the headlights, and they sat in near total darkness.
“Where are we?” she asked, her breathy voice almost a whisper.
“I’ll show you.” He got out of the car and she followed. He took her hand and led her along a dirt path as their eyes began to adjust to the moonlight. Thick clumps of trees and shrubs eventually gave way to a clearing on the shore of a lake. Half a dozen houses stood on the opposite side, most of them dark, but a few trailing streams of yellow light across the surface of the water.
“This is a beautiful place,” she said quietly.
“Cooler here, too, did you notice?” He stood close, her hand still clasped in his.
She nodded. “Who lives over there?”
“Beverly Bell lives in the one on the far right—looks like a cabin? She still owns the Three B’s. A family named Murphy lives in the next one. Andy Murphy works construction projects for Jon Langley.”
“How about that one?” Ryanne pointed to the home on the far left, where a dock jutted into the lake.
“Paige Duncan bought that place awhile back. She runs the pet store. Does dog grooming. Single. In her twenties.”
Ryanne looked up at Nick’s face. “Attractive?”
He nodded. “But not a knockout.”
She smiled.
Nick stepped behind her and placed his arms around her, hugging her gently. Leaning back into his sturdy embrace, she laid her head against his shoulder and gazed up at the stars. A gentle breeze flattened her filmy skirt against her legs. “It’s peaceful here.”
Nick nudged his nose against her hair, touched his lips to her ear. A shiver raced along her skin and tightened her nipples. Each second that ticked past increased the tension she was feeling inside. They both knew what they’d planned and anticipated ever since the night before, and the time had come to explore this burning attraction further.
Taking her shoulders gently, Nick turned her to face him. She favored herself with the pleasure of touching him, flattening her palms over his shirtfront, raising one finger to his chin, to the cleft in his upper lip.
Nick parted his lips and touched his tongue to her fingertip. Heat flooded Ryanne’s body. The night air took on a heavy, seductive quality. The universe and all the twinkling stars in the heavens seemed to revolve around this moment, this patch of grassy bank. Ryanne and Nick were the only two people who existed right then and there, and that was as it should be. They had no past and no future, but only that moment. She stared at the longing in his expression and reveled in the fact that he felt such desire for her.
Ryanne dropped her hand to his shoulder and lifted her mouth in invitation. Nick accepted her offering immediately, lowering his head and covering her lips in a hungry, invasive kiss. She welcomed the play of his tongue as it delved and lingered and kindled the fire, which blazed hotter and hotter. Her knees grew weak with the mounting sensations, but Nick supported her weight, wrapping his arms around her.
Through her clothing, her sensitized flesh made out his hard chest and thighs, his belt buckle, as well as the pressing evidence of his arousal. Toe-curling excitement spiraled through her limbs, and she pressed closer.
Breaking the kiss, Ryanne studied him in the moonlight, amazed again that this was her old friend Nick and that she found him the sexiest man alive. He brushed the back of his curled fingers against her cheek, a decidedly adoring gesture that spoke to her needy heart. He truly found her beautiful. She smiled at the amazing fact.
Running his fingers down the bare skin of her arm, he caught her hand and raised it to his mouth, then pressed his lips against the palm. The slight roughness of his cheek against her fingertips caused her stomach to dip.
“Remember you said I make you feel like you’re sixteen?” she asked.
“I remember.”
“Well, I never felt like this when I was sixteen.”
He chuckled. “Here I was worried about you, and you were saving yourself.”
She raised her other hand and combed his short silky hair away from his temple. “In fact, I’ve never felt like this.”
He studied her curiously. “You’ve never felt sixteen?”
She shook her head. “No, I’ve never felt…this…” She made a fist and tapped it against his chest, frustrated at the lack of words—and too embarrassed to choose any to explain. “This,” she said helplessly.
Nick used a knuckle to raise her chin. “I’ve never felt this before, either, Rye.”
He understood, and that pleased her immeasurably.
He leaned over her to initiate a new kiss, and she wrapped both arms around his neck and returned it with renewed passion. Maybe she was crazy, but nothing had ever felt so good or so right. Nick made her feel good about herself, and she needed that confidence more than anything.
Running his palms up her sides, he brought them around to cup her breasts through her cotton top. Their lips parted and he swore softly. “No bra?” he questioned.
“It’s hot,” she breathed against his chin, but even though the night was warm, goose bumps had risen on her flesh.
Nick slid his hands under her top and found her nipples, rolling them between his thumbs and forefingers until she couldn’t bear the exquisite torture. Her knees buckled.
He caught her, tilted
her back while supporting her with one arm, and tasted her neck, nipped at her earlobe and darted his tongue in and out of the hollows behind her ear. All the while he continued his splendid caress of her breast.
Ryanne straightened her body and raised her knee alongside Nick’s thigh. He reached down and cupped her bottom, pulling her against him, and covering her mouth with his.
She kissed him with need and longing she’d only just discovered had been buried deep within her. She was greedy for him, for more of him.
Bunching up her skirt, he slid his palm under the fabric, found his way under her skimpy panties and stroked her bottom. The caresses grew bolder, curving under her backside.
“We could lie down here,” she suggested through a heated glaze of anticipation.
“The mosquitoes would eat you alive,” he replied.
“Too bad we didn’t bring a bigger car,” she said.
“Rye, we can’t have sex right here,” he told her, regret evident in his voice.
Disappointment edged into her consciousness. “Why not?”
“I don’t have anything with me.”
Her mind cleared enough to think. “You don’t need anything.”
“Why not?”
“I’ve had a shot. I can’t get pregnant.”
“Really.” He straightened, loosening his hold on her and separating their bodies. Loss swept through her.
“Really,” she replied.
“Don’t you want to think it through?” he asked, holding her by the shoulders now.
“No. No, I don’t.” She straightened her skirt, avoiding his eyes, acutely uncomfortable talking about this now that he wasn’t holding her.
“Because if you think about it, you’ll change your mind?”
She pulled away from him and took a step backward. Her body trembled with a combination of arousal and confusion. “Forget it,” she said, feeling foolish and far too aggressive now that the mood had been broken.
“Is that your solution to everything? Forget it?” he asked. “Because I’m not forgetting. Any of this.”
Shaking, she headed for the car, hoping she’d taken the right path, relieved when she heard his footsteps behind her.
She got in the passenger side and slammed the door.
Nick All Night Page 10
