by JoAnn Ross
Which gave her the nerve to say what she’d been thinking for days.
“You. I want you.”
“Far be it from me to deny you anything your sweet, sexy little heart desires.” Before she could perceive his intention, he scooped her up, tossed her over his shoulder, and carried her into the house.
44
“I don’t remember Rhett carrying Scarlett this way,” she said from her upside-down position as he kicked the door shut, pausing only long enough to twist the lock.
“The guy didn’t know what he was missing.” Her nightshirt had slid down nearly to her waist, leaving her bottom bared to his touch. “I like this better.”
Although it might not seem as romantic as Clark Gable carrying Vivien Leigh up that staircase, Annie, branded by his hand on her heated skin, decided she preferred this move, too.
“Where’s the bedroom?”
“Upstairs. First door to the left.”
He found it without any trouble, then set her back onto her feet beside the sleigh bed she’d found at Angie’s Antiques and Collectibles. It had taken her weeks to sand the peeling white paint off it and to paint it a soft cream color as an accent to the sea blue walls. Although it was still more than an hour before dawn, she’d drifted off with the wooden blinds and window open, allowing light from the moon to stream in. The room seemed to grow smaller and smaller as he spent a long time looking down at her, as if seeking answers to some question he hadn’t asked.
“Mac.” She had never begged any man before. But at this moment, she would beg for him. “Please.”
“Please what?” He bent his head and lowered his mouth to hers, nipping at her bottom lip. “Kiss you?”
“That’s a start.”
“Exactly. Just a start . . . Lift your arms.”
His dark and dangerous tone possessed the power to fog her thoughts. When she did as he’d asked, he caught the hem of her very unsexy nightshirt and in one deft movement pulled it over her head and tossed it onto a nearby chair.
Leaving her standing completely naked, with the sea breeze from the open window whispering against her bare skin.
The night sky was atypically clear, free of clouds. Annie had never realized until now, when she felt as if she were standing in a spotlight, how very bright moonlight could be.
“The neighbors—”
“Live a very long way down your driveway and around the corner.”
Which was true. One of the things she loved about her house was that except for the occasional sea kayaker paddling by, she had absolute privacy.
“I’ve been imagining you like this for days.” The desire in his eyes echoed his words. “Since we first met at Still Waters.”
“You certainly hid it well.” Another first. She never pouted. But she did now.
He smiled, just a little, at her aggrieved tone. “I think I knew you were going to be dangerous.”
“You were rude.”
“Guilty. But maybe I can make that up to you.” He ran his hand from her shoulder to her thigh. “I’d never do anything to hurt you.”
But he could, she realized suddenly. Her plan of living in the moment, of sex for sex’s sake, of celebrating the now—or whatever trendy-modern-woman term she wanted to use for it—was backfiring.
She’d already begun to care. Too much. He could, without even meaning to, hurt her more than those thoughtless boys or Owen ever had.
His hands slid down her back, cupping her bare bottom, lifting her against him. He was hard and thick and the rough scrape of the denim against her bare skin had her wanting him inside her.
Now.
But before she could get the words out, he took her mouth in a kiss as hard as the body grinding against her. Her lips parted, inviting the thrusting invasion of his tongue, and as they pulled each other down onto the bed, she wanted to eat him up.
As he fed her slow, deep kisses, he touched her everywhere.
“Do you like it when I touch you here?” He cupped her breasts again, causing them to swell into his hands.
“Yes.”
“And when I put my mouth on your beautiful breasts?”
He took first one, then the other, into his mouth, tugging, tasting, nipping at her nipples, causing a rushing pleasure just this side of pain.
“Oh, yes.”
His hands and mouth continued their quest, taking the same path as earlier, but without the barrier of the cotton nightshirt. He licked the underside of her breasts, which she’d never realized could be such an erogenous zone, then down her stomach, causing her to arch her hips as his tongue dipped into her navel.
“You know what I was thinking about, all night at the station while playing those damn hot songs?” he asked, his words vibrating against her lower stomach like a tuning fork.
“What?” she managed, as she lifted her hips, wanting, needing, for him to touch her there.
“Touching you.” His fingers skimmed lower, and yes, parted her there.
“Oh, God, yes.” This time he didn’t need to ask as pleasure and still more need tangled within her.
“And tasting you.” With his hands spreading her thighs, he did exactly that, his tongue gliding over her center.
“Mac.” Her hands felt inordinately heavy as they lifted from his back to tangle in his hair. She heard a ragged whimper, and belatedly realized it had broken free from her own parched lips. “Please. I need you.” She was writhing beneath him. “Inside me.”
“And you’ll have me.” She’d never known that any man could possess such patience. “But we’re no longer on the clock, Annie my sweet.” Oh, God, his teeth had replaced his tongue, having her on the verge of going off like a rocket. How did he know to do that? “And I’m not nearly done with you.”
To prove his point, his mouth claimed her. There. Sucking, licking, nipping, devouring her, creating a pleasure so sharp, so acute, she could only plead, over and over, in a voice that sounded nothing like her own, for him to stop.
To never stop.
Until the pleasure grew too intense, and suddenly her entire world was spinning away, into that dark night sky, flinging her among the white-hot stars, where she scattered into a million little pieces of light.
Afterward, as she fell back to earth, Annie thought she might have gone blind. Perhaps she’d even fainted—because she couldn’t understand how she’d ended up lying, chest to chest, against Mac as he held her close, his lips pressed against the top of her damp head.
“Okay.” Her body was still suffering internal aftershocks. “If we didn’t just have an earthquake, it’s official.”
“What?”
He smoothed the soaked strands of hair away from her face and touched his mouth to hers. In contrast to his earlier kisses, this one was as soft and gentle as dandelion fluff blowing on the wind.
“You’re a sex god.”
He laughed at that. A deep, rough sound she could feel rumbling up from his rock-hard chest.
“Hardly.” His lips skimmed up her cheek as his hand moved down her back, his fingers tracing patterns that, amazingly, were getting her all hot and itchy again. “It’s you.”
She blinked to clear her vision and read the truth in his gaze. Truth and a very raw masculine hunger, which reminded her that while she’d been flying among the stars, she’d—damn—forgotten something elemental.
That it was only good sexual etiquette for the guy to get off, too.
“I think it’s us.” How else could she explain the chemistry that had sparked between them from the beginning? Or that he’d managed to do what no other man had ever done?
She slid her hands beneath his shirt. “But you’re wearing way too many clothes.”
45
Question, Mac thought, as he stood beside the bed, stripping off his clothes, risking endangering his junk with those damn metal buttons: How many guys, in the history of mankind, ever got off talking about their relationship?
He kicked off his shoes.
How ab
out none?
Although his hormone-crazed body had tried to tune out his more rational mind, Mac knew, on some level, that Annie had a point about their situation being more complicated. Because any decision he made, for the next twelve years, would have to factor in his daughter.
Who obviously adored Annie Shepherd.
Which wasn’t why he was here, in the woman’s bedroom, stripped down to a pair of navy ribbed boxer briefs and on the verge of getting his brains screwed out.
He was here because whatever was happening to him—to his mind, his body, and yes, dammit, his heart, was beyond his power to stop.
While the topic definitely wasn’t at the top of his hit parade of things to discuss, he and Annie were going to talk about where they were going. But right now, at this moment, looking down at her on those pretty flowered sheets, all naked and flushed and warm, all Mac could think about was how many times over the past days, and especially the nights, he had imagined her like this. Too many to count.
He wanted.
She wanted.
And as an early predawn light filtered into the bedroom, that was enough.
He’d never met a woman who managed to be both guarded and open at the same time. Although she was no virgin, there was something untouched about her, which was why, although he’d felt as if he was slowly killing himself, he’d forced himself to take his time, learning her secrets, teaching her the sensual pleasure of simply lying back and enjoying them.
Her body had been a banquet of sweet flesh, of hollows and curves, and he’d feasted, savoring every tasty inch.
But now it was her turn, and she proved to be a quick study as she moved over him, her breasts, then her lips carving a happy trail down his chest, then beyond, touching and tasting as he’d done to her.
She’d begun slowly, almost tentatively, learning his body as he’d learned hers, but as she picked up the pace, her hands and mouth streaking over him, Mac’s mind fogged.
Needs battered away at him, and his hunger had claws.
Unable to hold back any longer, he reached out blindly and grabbed the condom he’d put on her bedside table. Although he hadn’t fumbled with a condom since he’d had sex with Pam Wagner in the backseat the summer after his senior year of high school, not only had Annie managed to twist him inside out but she’d somehow turned all his fingers to thumbs as well, and finally, in desperation, he ripped the package open with his teeth.
“Oh, I like that,” she said, saving him from complete humiliation by taking it from his hand. “Very caveman-like.”
“I don’t think cavemen had condoms,” he managed as she took him in her hands.
“Probably not,” she agreed as she rolled the latex down his length. “But without cable, I’ll bet they spent a lot of time doing this.”
With her hands on his chest and her eyes on his, she lowered herself onto him and began to move in a way that had him fearing he would blast off before they even got started.
“Give me a minute.”
Her smile, in the pinkening light of dawn, was one of the sexiest things he’d ever seen. “I make you crazy.”
“How about fucking insane?”
He cupped her hips, willing his body to slow down. To settle in. To make this last.
“We’ve already done sweet and slow,” she said, leaning forward, brushing her breasts against his chest, her body tightening around him like a wet fist.
“What would you say to hard”—her hips began to rock—“and fast this time?”
That was all the invitation he needed. Holding her waist, he drove up into her. Hard and deep, so deep she gasped, but instead of pulling away, she met his pace, keeping up with him even as he rolled them over, arms and legs entwined.
Then, needing to regain some control, he caught her wrists, holding her arms above her head as he pistoned into her. Mindlessly. Recklessly.
“Look at me,” he said on a deep, guttural growl. Yeah. Like a caveman.
She opened her eyes, which had fluttered shut, and met his gaze.
Then whimpered as he pulled halfway out, torturing them both.
“Now,” he said.
“Oh, yes,” she breathed. “Now.”
He plunged into her, one long, strong stroke that had her weeping out his name even as what little was left of his mind exploded.
Empty, drained, and not sure he would ever be able to move again, Mac collapsed onto her, burying his lips against her throat.
“That was,” he said—
“Wonderful,” she said with a slow, satisfied sigh.
And, apparently as spent as he was, she immediately crashed into sleep.
Mac glanced at the clock’s illuminated dial, calculating how much time he had before Emma woke up at home, needing her father.
Enough, he decided as he went into the adjoining bathroom and took care of the condom. Then he returned to bed, lying behind her, cuddled like spoons, and followed her, dropping like a stone into sleep.
• • •
He might not have been a warrior, but radio work had given Mac an internal clock in his head that told him when to wake up so as not to miss a shift. Even during those long-ago party days. His time on the FOBs had taught him to sleep quick.
Which he did, only to wake up to find Annie leaning on one elbow and looking down at him, a serious expression on her lovely face.
“How long have you been awake?”
“Only a few minutes.” She smiled. “I was enjoying the view.” He followed her gaze to his morning erection.
“It tends to do that,” he said. “Even when I haven’t been dreaming of the hot woman who managed to screw my brains out.”
“I did, didn’t I?” The smile reached those remarkable eyes, turning them to gleaming pewter. “It was mutual.” She stretched lazily, like a cat, which had the rest of his body catching up to his penis. “Now, unfortunately, you have to get going.”
He didn’t need to glance at the clock to know that once again time was running out on them.
“Yeah. I’m sorry. I want to stay here, but—”
She touched a very un-Annie-like red fingertip to his lips. “I understand. I was just wondering if you had time for coffee.” She skimmed a fingernail down the inside of his thigh, frowning a bit at the white scars left behind by shrapnel. “And maybe a shower.” Her eyes drifted up to the part of his body he could’ve flown Old Glory from.
“It seems a shame to let that go to waste,” she said, revealing the inner seductress that he’d suspected had been lurking inside her.
“Shelter Bay is nothing if not anti-waste,” he agreed.
“And think of all the water we’ll save.”
“You’ve convinced me that it’s our patriotic duty.”
She was out of the bed, standing over him, all tousled and still glowing from multiple orgasms, looking like every guy’s wet dream. “To save our country. And maybe even the planet.”
Mac tried to remember the last time he’d felt this good. And decided he’d never felt this freaking good before.
“God bless America.”
46
After a shower that was anything but quick, Mac was standing in Annie’s tidy kitchen, drinking coffee before leaving. Which he didn’t want to do. But he had no choice.
“Come to breakfast with me.”
“You have to go home to your daughter. And I have to get to work. All the tourists will start arriving today for the Matchmaking Fair. If I’m taking the Fourth off, I need to be there to help Kim with sales.”
“I get that. But we can eat at the house. With Dad and Emma. Then you can go to work and I can play Barbie, or tea party, or make a scrapbook or whatever little girls do when they know they’ve got their fathers wrapped around their little finger.”
“Or their cracked wrist,” Annie said with a smile. “And breakfast sounds wonderful. If you’re sure your father won’t mind.”
“He’d love it.”
“So would I.” Even though she knew s
he was risking getting in over her head, Annie wanted to spend every minute she could with Mac. “Why don’t you go ahead? I’ll be over as soon as I feed my cat.”
“See how much you’ve distracted me? I even forgot, when I came here last night, that you have a cat.” He glanced around. “Where is it?”
“I put him in the guest bedroom when you first arrived because it takes him a while to warm up to people.”
As if taking that comment as a test, he said, “I’d like to meet him.”
“I’m not sure that’s such a good idea.”
“Annie.” He leaned down and kissed her. He tasted of coffee and her minty, teeth-whitening, cavity-fighting toothpaste. “What I said about not liking cats? I didn’t really mean it. I was just in a lousy mood.”
“Okay. But don’t say I didn’t warn you.” She went and fetched Pirate, carrying him downstairs.
The minute the cat spotted the interloper, he jumped out of her arms, hit the floor, and bristled his fur.
“Hey, Pirate.” Mac bent down, his hand extended to pat the tiger cat.
“Oh, I wouldn’t—”
Too late. Annie watched as Pirate moved first. Hissing, he took a swipe with his paw, his razor-sharp nails fully extended.
“Okay,” Mac said, as they both watched the thin red line appear on the back of his hand.
“Oh, my God, I’m sorry.” Annie grabbed a paper towel and began squirting antiseptic soap on it.
Meanwhile, the demon cat stared Mac down with yellow eyes, then, apparently satisfied that he’d made his point, claimed his turf, or whatever went through crazed feline minds, sauntered over to a sunbeam, plopped his big butt down, and began washing his huge, deadly paws.
“Don’t worry about it,” he said, as Annie dabbed madly at the wound. “He should probably get extra kibble, for watchcat duty.”
“He’s really quite docile,” she said. “Well, maybe that’s not the right word, exactly. He’s admittedly territorial. I think because he was a stray for so long, he’s decided that he’s not going to risk anyone throwing him back out onto the street. But he does get used to people. In his way.”
