Winter Wanderlust: A Romantic Anthology

by Gina Drayer

  Jake craned his head around in surprise. His reaction made her even surer about her intentions. Those blue eyes raked over her wet, naked body from top to toe then back up, finally meeting her eyes and holding them. Struck speechless, he only stared.

  “Maybe we can help each other,” she said. “Come in out of the cold, Jake.”

  He stood slowly, never taking his eyes off her. “Justine…” he said gruffly, finally finding his voice. His eyes held a question, but the undeniable arousal beneath his towel told her what she wanted to know.

  She nodded.

  With a flick of his finger his towel dropped to the floor. He stepped in, shutting the door behind him with one hand. He stood very still for a second just looking at her while her heart pounded, uncertainty and doubt beginning to overcome her will to take this step.

  When he first reached out to her she tensed, expecting the harsh force of a man overcome by passion, but he only grazed his fingertips lightly over the wet curve of her waist and hip.

  “Call me crazy, but I need you to tell me you want this,” he said, his voice straining with need.

  “I let you in here, didn’t I?”

  “You look scared, Justine.”

  “I’m fucking terrified, but I’d rather examine my bullshit afterwards, if that’s alright with you. Jake, I need you…” She meant to say more but her constitution broke down.

  He nodded and stepped toward her. The warm urgency of his kiss sent a jolt down her center and confirmed that he had no qualms whatsoever, as if his hard arousal pressed against her belly weren’t enough.

  She pulled him beneath the hot stream of the shower, moaning against his lips. He palmed her breasts, their slick weight feeling heavier to her when he lifted them and bent to suck each tip in turn.

  God, she wanted him to fuck her but she couldn’t find the courage to tell him so, and he seemed strangely hesitant to just take her as she hoped he would.

  “Oh God,” she murmured, clutching at his head. He started to kiss his way southward. He glanced up, his blue eyes bright with need.

  “I can stop here, but not if we take this any farther. I’m just warning you.”

  “Don’t stop,” she said, and leaned back against the cold tile wall, the hot water falling between them while he knelt before her.

  He slipped his hands up her thighs, teasing his thumbs along the juncture of her hips, moving closer to her center in gentle sweeps of skin on skin. His light touches made her crave even more contact until he seemed to read her mind and slipped one thumb between her slick folds and rubbed the pad of his thumb in a tight circle right over her already throbbing clit.

  She let out a little whimper and her hips twitched involuntarily. Gripping one ankle, he urged her foot onto his shoulder and dipped his head. He swirled his tongue around her swollen clit, then sucked it delicately between his lips. She let out a low moan and pulled his head tighter against her, forcing his tongue even deeper. His fingertips dug into her hips and he seemed to lose himself in tasting her, his tongue working slowly and deliberately.

  One of his hands slid up her side and squeezed her breast. She placed her own hand over it, gripping tightly. His fingers gripped hers in response and she looked down, meeting blue eyes staring back up at her. His look was desperate, in contrast to the steady slip of his tongue back and forth against her clit. He’d make her come if he did that for much longer, but as good as it felt, she needed more.

  She urged him up, marveling at the concern that immediately replaced the lustful determination in his eyes.

  “What is it?” he asked. “Did I do something wrong?”

  “No . . . It’s just that I have this big, scary bed upstairs. Was wondering if you’d help me . . . subdue it.”

  He grinned. “If the fair lady needs a knight to slay a mighty monster, I’m the man for the job.”

  She cranked off the water, nervous as hell about inviting a man into her bed for the first time since Zach’s death. Even thinking the words “Zach’s death” exhausted her now. She flattened her hands against the wet wall and took a deep breath.

  “We don’t have to,” Jake said behind her, his touch feather-light but comforting against her shoulder.

  “But you want to.”

  “What I want is irrelevant.”

  Tears began to flow again, unbidden, and she took a deep breath trying to suppress them.

  “Should I go?” he asked.

  “No!” she said it louder than she’d intended, the syllable echoing around the small enclosure. She turned around and stared up at him. “Fuck me here, Jake. But make love to me upstairs. Can you do that?”

  Without missing a beat, he nodded and kissed her again, rough this time, his tongue plunging into her mouth with insistence. He broke away briefly and their eyes met. In that second she recognized the pain they both shared, and knew he did, too. She sensed him dropping a barrier for her sake. Her fingertips threaded into his short hair and she surrendered to him.

  With a harsh moan, he squeezed her thighs, lifting her roughly and pressing her against the wall.

  “You want to get fucked, huh?” His voice was low and suggestive, but when she looked in his eyes she only saw the depth of understanding behind his earnest determination.

  “Yes,” she whispered, the sound silenced when his mouth covered hers with bruising intensity.

  She wrapped her legs around him and her eyes flew wide open when he sank into her with a muffled grunt against her lips. Between the taste of him and the fullness of his cock thrusting into her she dimly registered his hand reaching out to turn the water back on, flooding them both with wet heat.

  The white noise of the water beating down on the tiles around them echoed the rising static that tingled across her skin from his touch. He bent his head again to suck the tip of one breast into his mouth, but he never stopped the steady rhythm. The rising heat in her center grew with each stroke.

  “Justine,” he gasped. “God, you’re beautiful.”

  She inhaled sharply. Jake’s words of praise were an unexpected interjection in the midst of lovemaking. Zach had never been vocal.

  It didn’t stop there, either. “Fucking you feels like Heaven, you know that?” With his gaze on her and his cock pounding deep into her she realized how much she’d missed, and how desperately she wanted to feel something new.

  “Fuck me harder,” she demanded, pulling his head down and kissing him.

  “You make a man work, don’t you?” he said, coming up for breath again but urgently working to meet her demands. The tiles of the shower rubbed against her harshly but the pressure of his cock against the most sensitive parts of her made the discomfort fade away.

  Oh fuck he knew what he was doing.

  “Jake! Oh God!” she yelled, terrified when she hit the edge. She clung desperately to him as her climax overtook her. The entire situation abruptly seemed surreal, like she was falling and he was the only one who could catch her.

  But he held her tight. He thrust into her once more with a harsh groan, his eyes opening and locking onto hers when she felt the hot pulse of him inside her.

  “I’m here,” he said, burying his face against her wet neck, his arms wrapping around her while her own body subsided its shivering. His hold on her didn’t subside in the aftermath. The water still streamed down around them, the steam obscuring the door and making the small space seem smaller, yet more infinite at the same time.

  They gasped like two grateful survivors who’d barely escaped a gut-wrenching ordeal and come out the other side, not unscathed, but at least alive.

  They washed quickly and dried off without speaking, then made their shaky way up to her room wrapped in thick terrycloth robes.

  The blizzard still blew hard outside, icy snowflakes hissing against the thick glass of her window, the only light in the room that from the gas fireplace. The turmoil of the weather seemed a perfect counterpoint to the desperation with which they came together for the second time. By the th
ird time, they slowed down and began savoring each other’s touch, the earlier desperation gone, their inhibitions nonexistent. Her body became a minefield he was intent on uncovering by firelight, reveling in each explosive response he elicited from her. With each kiss and thrust she felt like she was coming back to herself for the first time in a year.

  Just before dawn she woke and stared out at the blowing whiteness beyond her window. A blank slate it would be when it finally subsided, and maybe she’d have one, too. A fresh start. For the first time she believed it was possible to move on.

  She watched him sleep in the gray light, his face utterly serene and still, devoid of any remnant of the pain she’d seen on it the night before. Eventually she succumbed to fatigue again and snuggled against him. His arm wrapped around her and pulled her close and she fell back asleep, content.

  ***

  Jake swam out of the depths of sleep gradually, something unusual for him. Usually he was thrust out harshly by the violent images his brain seemed to like to inflict on him during his slumber. During this languid awakening all he was aware of was the warm, soft shape nestled against his chest, the sweet, jasmine scent of her in his nostrils, and her round, naked backside snugly pressed against his groin.

  A low, contented rumble sounded in his chest and he grew hard in response to the feel of her solid warmth in his arms.

  Before he could process what to do, she made a contented sound and pressed back against him.

  “Again?” she murmured, glancing over her shoulder with a sly smile.

  The images from the night before were still clear in his mind, though a blur near the end. He couldn’t remember how many times they’d made love, and had been surprised as hell each time he found himself ready for more.

  “There’s something about you,” he said. “I just can’t get enough.”

  She chuckled. “Trust me, the feeling’s mutual, but…” She seemed to stiffen.

  “Maybe we should talk?” he said.

  She turned to face him, slipping her fingers through the blond hair that dusted his chest. Her brown eyes gazed up at him, expectantly. “You first,” she said.

  “Damn, put me on the spot why don’t you. Alright . . . I don’t make a habit of sleeping with out-of-towners, but I like you. A lot. Only I know you’ll probably be gone in a few days so I’m at a loss here.”

  The gradual smile that crept across her face made him suspicious. “What is it?” he asked.

  “What if I told you I wasn’t leaving?”

  “What? Why not?”

  “You never asked me why I was here.”

  “Well, I just assumed you were on vacation.”

  “I’m here because I work here. Starting Monday I’m the Lodge’s new pastry chef. My equipment is likely stuck in transit, though, so I don’t have a damn thing to do until it gets here.”

  The instant elation made his entire body tingle, but he was suddenly done talking. He pushed her back against the mattress and kissed her until they were both breathless.

  She wrapped her legs around his hips and tilted hers up, inviting him in. Come in out of the cold, Jake, he heard in his mind as he sank into her to the hilt again. This time, and for the first time since he’d left the service, he felt like he’d finally come home.

  Jesse Pearle grew up in the mountains of Western North Carolina in a place where there was no danger in dancing naked in the moonlight at the top of a mountain. Always possessed of a creative mind, but never quite the right amount of focus, she wandered for decades. She received a degree in fine art which she put to poor use working an uneventful desk job for an engineering company when she started writing her first really ambitious piece of fiction. She continues to write engaging contemporary romance and erotica.

  Website: http://jessepearle.com/

  CHAPTER Four

  Reason's Fault

  by Kate Whitaker

  “You’re not mad are you, sweetie?” Her mother’s voice bobbled between the vapid tone that meant she was lying and the soothing tone that indicated she didn’t want a fight.

  Melinda’s temples pounded. “Mom, we’ve been planning this trip for a year.”

  “And your father and I can’t make it due to the weather. There’s a storm here in D.C. as well.”

  “Mom,” Melinda forced her throat to open. “Mom, I’ve been here for three days. You and Dad promised me a week at Liberty Springs.”

  “Linny, honey, your father can’t up and leave work. There’s a massive scandal right now.”

  The nickname and the tone took her right back to grade school. “Too bad I didn’t build the Washington Monument out of toothpicks again. You both managed to show up for that.”

  “Don’t you-”

  “Don’t what, mom? Tell you, once again, that being the daughter of a senator sucks? Or that you and dad were and still are horrible parents?”

  Silence greeted her on the other end for a long moment and when her mother spoke again her voice was icier than the wind that howled outside. “Again, Melinda, we’re sorry. We have to cancel. We’ll pay for your vacation, of course.”

  “You still haven’t learned that buying me stuff isn’t the same as spending time with me, have you?” Melinda locked her phone and stifled the urge to scream at the top of her lungs. Her breath came in great bursting gasps until her ribs hurt. The need to break something overcame her. Melinda sat on the huge bed to begin pummeling the soft pillows when her phone buzzed.

  Her father’s text blinked onto her screen. ‘Linny, there was no need to make your mother cry. No worries, I’ve still got the bill. Dad.’

  Her arm jerked and the phone flew through the air. It went through the window with sharp crash of breaking glass and a male voice spat, “Oh Christ!”

  Melinda scampered across her bed, fear pounding in her temple as she threw herself at her window.

  A man looked up at her, a hand on his forehead and a frown on his bloody face. “What the hell, lady?”

  “I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.” She clutched at her sweater. “Hold on I’ll be right down. Don’t move.”

  She grabbed her leather trench coat and tore through the hall to the front door. To both her relief and further anxiety the man still stood there in the evening gloom and falling snow.

  “Oh god, are you ok?” She yanked his hand away from his forehead. An ugly lump had already formed and there were several shallow cuts on his cheeks.

  “More or less.” He touched the lump and winced a little. “I’m just not sure what I did to piss you off.”

  She paused unsure what to say, and he laughed. His laugh was big and boisterous and oddly familiar. Melinda took a step back and really looked at him. He wasn’t handsome, but he was interesting. Closer to forty than her own thirty-three years, his nose was a little long for his face, and his teeth just slightly crooked. Bright green eyes stood out in his pale face. His hair hung ragged and a pale bluish green.

  Her heart sank and her cheeks burned as recognition came. “Oh my god, I just assaulted Daryl Chambers.” She covered her mouth and glanced around not sure if she was looking for paparazzi or a place to hide.

  The former front man for Reason’s Fault and the object of all her adolescent fantasies laughed again. “I’m fine really. I think your phone is toast, though.”

  The bright purple rectangle was nearly buried in the snow. Melinda rushed over and brushed at the snow. The screen was dark and cracked.

  Melinda sighed. “Well at least I won’t be getting any more upsetting text messages.” She turned back to Daryl. “Again, I am so, so sorry.”

  He shrugged. “I’ve gotten worse stage diving.” The drying blood on his cheeks cracked when he smiled at her again. “You have a hell of an arm on you.”

  “Six years pitching softball.” Melinda fought down a blush. “Still I need to see Leonard and ask for a new room, and we should really get you cleaned up.”

  “Leonard? The concierge?”

  Melinda nodded and gest
ured towards the door of the lodge. “Yeah, he’s an old friend of the family’s.”

  Luckily, Leonard was at the desk. His verdant gaze was stern as Melinda explained what had happened.

  “We will, of course, be charging your credit card for the window.”

  “Of course, Leonard.” Thank you for picking up the bill, Dad.

  Abby, the desk clerk, giggled as she cleaned up Daryl. Melinda was both jealous and oddly amused. Daryl suffered the giggles and the cleaning with a good natured smile, and he signed an envelope while Leonard’s back was turned.

  “Linny, here’s your new key cards. You can leave the old ones on the dresser. Do you need me to move your bags?”

  Her amusement faded. “No, Leonard. And I really am sorry.”

  The concierge snorted. “Your parents had better hurry before it gets worse out there.”

  “They weren’t able to make it.” Melinda swallowed the lump in her throat.

  Leonard’s stern disapproval vanished. “I’m so sorry, Linny.”

  “It’s ok.” She shrugged. “I still get a week in my favorite place.”

  Leonard smiled. “That’s my good girl. Now, get out of that freezing room before the snow starts piling up.”

  Melinda hugged him, and turned back to Daryl. Abby’s big grin was goofy and Daryl seemed completely occupied with her. Melinda waited for an awkward few moments but didn’t have a clue how to interrupt their conversation, or even why she thought she had the right to.

  She walked away briskly, hugging herself through her thick leather coat. In her rooms the snow was already piling up in drifts on the thick carpet like Leonard had predicted. Melinda hurried to pack up her stuff. She piled her garment bag on top of her huge suitcase, shouldered her purse and toiletry bag, and staggered out into the hall.

  “Need a hand?”

  Melinda turned to Daryl Chamber’s off center smile and felt her face burn again. “Uh, no thanks, I got it.”