by Julie Kenner
The sand, once grainy against her back, now softened with each wave that hit the shore and buoyed her.
He slid his hands slowly up her sides and back down to the crease where her hip met her thigh and she shuddered when he touched her pelvis and brushed his thumb over her swollen sex.
He pushed at her knees, nudging them farther apart and slipped his hands under her buttocks.
She sighed as, once again, his breath fanned across her inner thighs. And thought she’d scream at his teasing kisses and nips. A whimpering groan slipped from her mouth as he slowly drew his tongue along her aching flesh.
She realized her arms were still crossed above her head and she lowered them to brace herself against the shifting sand beneath her. She slapped her palms to the sand and arched her back with a strangled cry of pure pleasure. His hands tightened on her buttocks at the sound, and he moaned deep in his throat as his mouth teased over her sex.
Long moans, one after the other, poured out of her as his tongue rasped over her clit. Stabs of rapture shuddered through her, tightening in her core, as his tongue danced like a flame against her throbbing flesh.
The movements of his tongue took her higher as the waves slapped against her, stimulating every nerve ending in her body until he pushed her over.
Wave after wave continued to rock through her. Then he did something no other man had ever done. He waited, patiently until she dropped ever so slightly from the peak and his tongue took her again. She climaxed so hard, her body convulsed in pure pleasure.
He slid his body up along hers, linking his hands with hers on the sand.
“You were…” She had no words. Her brain could not form the sentence. Her thoughts scattered as the aftershocks trembled through her. She was still trying to come back to her senses. “That was… You need…”
“Shh,” he told her, then pulled her arms up around his neck and kissed her.
She was yielding in his arms, grateful for his strength, his guidance, his support of her. Any moment now she’d rally, she’d be a more vigorous partner, giving as well as taking…but right then, his kisses were almost as consuming as his tongue had been. Later…later she’d return the favor. He didn’t seem all that insistent anyway. And this felt too good. Nothing had ever felt this good.
He was both tender and intense, making her feel both protected and coveted at the same time. He tucked his hips against hers, still kissing her deeply, twining his tongue along hers as he slid his hands down and pulled her thighs up over his hips, pinning her to the sand. “JC….” he murmured against her lips. “I don’t want to stop, but—”
“Then don’t.” She buried her fingers in his wet curls and tugged his mouth back to hers.
“Protection,” he said, his body tensing as she hooked her heels behind his thighs.
“Damn. I totally didn’t think…”
He lifted his head, looked her in the eyes. “I have some at the house.”
The depths in his very dark eyes stole her breath. She’d never had a man look at her with such need before.
“Go get one.” He went to rise, but her arms brought his eyes back to hers. “And Zack, use those beautiful thighs and run, because I need you inside me, right now.”
It was a few long moments before he returned. His hot body dropped back onto hers. “I think I broke the sound barrier.”
“You did good,” were the only words she could muster. “Please, Zack.” The intense feeling she was experiencing was as thrilling as it was intimidating. But now was certainly not the time to worry about that. She needed….
Her thoughts scattered as he slid slowly, fully and completely inside her.
She dug her fingers into his shoulders and locked her ankles more tightly behind him as he thrust. His broad palms covered her hips, guiding her into him. She arched, moaned and, when he began to move faster, she matched his pace.
She’d never experienced this kind of basic, earthy, raw…almost primal lovemaking.
She wrapped her arms around him and held on, both of them lost in the pleasure as his thrusts grew deeper, faster. She wanted to linger, so she could savor every second, immerse herself in every feeling, every sensation, but she couldn’t even keep her eyes open to watch him. He was taking her up to the edge again and she could only ride the wave in surrender to the powerful emotions tingling through her. This is just sex. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she reminded herself of that. Or tried to.
Every instant they touched and kissed forged a binding union, a bond like no other. Ludicrous. She was relieved that she hadn’t blurted out her feelings, as she was certain when it was all over, she’d laugh at herself and her silly emotional reaction to what was just extraordinary sex.
And it was Zack Fanning, after all. Her dream finally come to life. So surely she was just tangling fantasy with the moment.
Thoughts scattered completely as he slowed, and she could feel his body poised in taut control to prepare for that last exquisite push. It was enough to send her over. Waves drove them across the sand; water poured over her sweat-slickened torso as she gasped for air and returned each thrust with equal force.
He released a harsh groan of surrender then and gripped her hips, rocking her in time to each frantic upward surge of his thick shaft within her. She gave herself over to him, reveled in his shuddering release, tightening around him to give them every last ounce of pleasure.
He was shaking as he slid from her body and let her legs drop from around his waist. He held her tightly against him as they both fought for breath.
It felt good being in his arms, she decided. Held so tightly, both cuddled and coddled. It wasn’t like her to accept that from anyone, most especially like this. She’d fought so long and hard for independence, it had carried over to all aspects of her personal life, including intimacy. So why she so willingly accepted him, his surprising tenderness, she had no idea. She chalked it up to…the stress. To the fantasy. Because her reality had never been like this.
He must have felt some nuance in her body because he strengthened his hold slightly, and then slid his hand up to cup her chin.
“Hey.”
That brought a smile to her lips. Men. Such a way with words. The silver-tongued devils. But she sobered at the bewildered look in his eyes. She wanted to make a silly comment, but the unexpected warmth she saw there stopped her from teasing him. She felt much the same way and wondered if he saw that in her eyes. “Hey, yourself.”
“That was…” His words just died, but he held her gaze, his blue eyes deepening in a way that jacked up her heart rate again.
“Yeah,” she said softly. “It was.”
He rolled and stood. Before she could even move, he’d gathered her into his arms, settling her against his chest. The soft places on her easing against all the hard planes on him. It felt remarkably fantastic…and far too perfect.
“I can walk.”
“I know that.”
He moved forward and, for once in her life, she let herself lean just a little bit more.
4
THE SOUND of the waves woke her. She shifted against the wall of hard, warm muscle and came face-to-face with a sleeping Zack Fanning.
Wow. Awake he had all that intensity working for him, but asleep, those blue eyes shuttered, she could study his arresting face. His thick, tousled blond hair lay on his stubbly cheek and forehead. JC could see red in his beard and in the long eyelashes that lay thick on his cheeks.
She reached out and pushed his hair off his forehead, the strands silky against her fingertips.
Gently she slid away from him when he stirred. She didn’t want to wake him. She found his robe behind the bathroom door and shrugged into it. Looking for her phone, she realized that she must have left it on the beach. She stepped outside into the beautiful day. The ocean lay like a ribbon of blue all the way to the horizon. She wished she had her board and could be out on the waves, riding free and easy.
She walked to the sand and found the shorts
she’d been wearing. Digging through the pocket, she found her phone. As she pressed Laci’s cell number, she started to pick up the clothing that had been discarded the night before.
“It’s about time. Did you work through the night to get your board nice and stiff?” Laci said slyly.
“You, my friend, are very bad.”
“Well, dish. Is he as good in bed as he looks?”
“Better.”
“Damn. I’m mad that you’re getting some and I have to just look.”
“Who you looking at?”
“It’s not exactly a smart move.”
“So, here I am sleeping with Zack Fanning when I should be getting my stuff together, practicing and watching my calendar to make sure I didn’t miss anything. Why not humor me with your blunders.”
“I hear you.”
“You know I would never say a word.”
“It’s Taylor….”
“Dutton? XtremeSportNet’s promoter? I wonder what Reggie would think of that.”
“I’m discreet. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about him since we met in San Clemente.”
“Oh, man,” JC said.
“Yeah, you can say that. He’s all man. That’s nothing. Drea is getting pretty chummy with her sponsor, Kirk Murray.”
“I met him last night at Da Kine. Even though we haven’t known Drea for very long, she’s a pistol. It seems he’s just Drea’s type, huh?”
“Yeah, hot, muscled and gorgeous. So, are we practicing today? The exhibition will be here before you know it.”
“Yes, I’m just getting my stuff together. I’m going to make breakfast and then see where I am. Zack thinks we can finish shaping the board today.”
“Unless something else comes up between you.”
“Stop it, bad girl. I’ll call you, okay?”
“Got it. Stay cool.”
JC went back up the beach and into the house, dropping the clothes in Zack’s laundry room and folding up her bathing suit and tucking it into a plastic bag before putting it into her purse.
She went into the living room to look for the remote as she liked a little noise while she was cooking, and noticed a room off to the side. Curious, she went to look inside and saw that it was some kind of production room. In it were clothes racks and fabric along with a sewing machine. She picked up a folder and started to page through it. There were plans in it to expand Zack’s business, budgets and projections, investors’ names listed, and trademark paperwork.
Flabbergasted, JC smiled, thinking it was a good thing he was going to expand…her thoughts abruptly halted when she saw the date on the paperwork. Sitting down at the desk, she discovered that these plans were four years old. All this had been sitting around for four years?
Why?
She walked up to the racks and realized that the clothes had not been sitting here for four years. They were clean and some of them still had pins in them. She pulled a short and halter set off the rack and swore softly under her breath. It was beautiful, with blocked colors. The little tag on the front said Color Babes. She pulled other clothes off the rack and saw labels that said Deepfish. There was stuff made for boys and men with labels printed with Hook, Line and Sinker and Starfish.
JC looked up at the wall and saw a sign done in blues and greens that said, Fanning Surfboards and Koi Apparel.
“What are you doing in here?”
JC jumped and turned. Zack stood in the doorway and for the first time since she met him, he didn’t give her that easy smile. His mouth was tight, his eyes stormy.
Uh-oh, this was a battleground and she’d just walked into it.
“Just looking around.”
“Is this what you do when you come to someone’s home? Snoop?”
“I wasn’t snooping. I was going to make breakfast.”
He stalked into the room until he was almost on top of her and she realized how very tall he was. “Well, you lost your way to the kitchen, Goldilocks. The porridge is in there.”
His proximity was making it really difficult to concentrate on what he was saying. Her body was getting the message loud and clear, but it had nothing to do with making breakfast.
She put the clothes back on the rack and deftly moved to one side and away from him so she could breathe.
“The clothes are beautiful. Did you design them?”
He glanced at the racks and then at her, then down at the desk and his face tightened. “Did you go through my papers, too?”
Zack moved around the desk and once again stood close to her. Bracing herself, she studied him. Up close like this, almost as close as they’d been last night when he’d kissed her, it was impossible not to get caught up in his intensity. He didn’t even have to try that hard. No one who witnessed those laser-beam eyes of his or the dangerous way he smiled could be under the impression that he was nothing but a laid-back surfer dude.
“Tell me something, Zack.”
“Sure,” he bit out. “Apparently I’m an open book to you.”
“What are you waiting for?” JC asked.
ZACK SIGHED and left.
In the kitchen he set up the coffeemaker and started it, ignoring JC as she stood in the kitchen doorway, staring at him.
Could a woman look any more beautiful? She’d been romping around in the ocean with him yesterday, was wearing his old bathrobe now and yet she looked fresh and breathtaking.
He’d admit that it had been a long time since he’d let a woman in his home, let alone in his heart, but in one night this woman had gotten a foothold and it spooked him. He had liked his life the way it was. He lived in the now, not in the past and not in the future.
“Are you going to give me an answer or duck the question? What are you waiting for?”
“And if I duck, JC? What then?”
“I’d have to wonder why fearless Zack Fanning was ducking anything.”
“Fearless.” He shook his head and met her eyes. “There are things to fear, JC. I found out the hard way.”
“So, are you afraid of expanding your business?”
“Not afraid. I’m cautious.”
“Cautious? It’s been four years since you made all those plans, Zack. From what I can tell, they look great. And the clothes…they’d sell like crazy to the surfing and nonsurfing crowd alike. They bridge a gap between the two. All you really need is a marketing plan.”
He opened the refrigerator door and pulled out eggs and bacon and set them on the counter.
“Do you know what it’s like to lose your dream, JC?”
“Not yet.”
“Then don’t tell me what I should or shouldn’t do. You can’t even make up your mind whether to face your father.”
Her eyes clouded and her lips tightened. She turned on her heel and started to walk away.
Damn. He was feeling threatened, but that was no reason to attack her. She was simply asking questions he should have been asking himself a long time ago. He should let her walk, but after last night he couldn’t.
He lunged for her and caught her loosely around the waist. He said, “I’m sorry. That was uncalled for. I…appreciate what you said about my designs. I understand where you’re coming from, but can we just agree that I’m not there yet?”
He’d lost himself when he’d lost surfing, had wallowed and, with every ounce of his strength, he’d pulled himself out and started making boards. His dream had disappeared on that stormy day in December when he wiped out and hit the rocks so hard it had shattered his knee. He’d been lucky he could still walk.
Now he lived by being careful not to want too much, need too much. Yet, standing in his sunny kitchen, he found himself thinking about JC and where they could go with what had been forged between them last night.
And the thought of what he wanted terrified him more than anything had since the day he’d lost his dream. JC was a surfer, and surfers went where the waves took them. He couldn’t follow. It would be better for them both if he just let her walk out of his ho
use. But he owed her a board and maybe an explanation.
“I’m sorry, too. I was snooping in your house and talking about things that really are none of my business. I barely know you. It’s that, you are so talented and I hate to see you waste it.”
“I had plans once and they didn’t work out. Now I’m more cautious about what I want, JC. That’s it.” Except in her case he hadn’t been cautious at all. He’d tried to convince himself that her only appeal was physical. That the bond humming between them was nothing more than sexual. But the memories of JC seduced him. He believed she had the courage to go where she needed to go. He, to his shame, did not.
She turned and looked up at him. “Trust me. You will know when the time is right. Just…don’t wait too long or it’ll pass you by.”
That spirit lured him, spoke to him in a language he heard distantly and longed to understand.
She lifted her face to his, her eyes unguarded and warm, daring him to leap into the unknown with her.
She left him defenseless.
A tendril of her hair tickled his nose, brought with it her scent, her sweetness. With her in his arms and her scent lingering near his mouth like a voice calling him, he couldn’t fight her, couldn’t fight himself. No longer wanted to.
She asked him for trust.
He didn’t know if he could trust.
Didn’t know if he had it in him to forget the lessons he’d made himself learn through the years since his accident. To depend only on himself. To look before he leapt. He wanted to lower his barriers and trust her, but caution, the ruling principle of his life, argued against it.
But caution, ah, caution held you back from taking something that would be worth the risk, caution paled against the lure of JC’s spirit.
“I’ll try,” he muttered into the curls tempting his mouth. “It’s not the answer you want, JC, but it’s the best I can do.”
“That’s all I want, Zack,” she whispered. “The hope that you’ll open yourself to the possibility. Risk is what it is—not good, not evil, either.”
Taking her hand he led her up to his bedroom, to the big bed they had slept in together. The room was filled with the memory of her already. He tugged her to the bed, pressing her down as he folded on top of her.
