Searching for Sea Glass: BEST-SELLING AUTHOR (Sea Glass Secrets Book 1)

by Wingate, Teal

  “Here, let me have him,” she said as she reached up to gather Billy in her arms.

  “I’ll carry him. Just lead the way.” He motioned towards the house.

  “I said give him to me,” she demanded.

  “I heard what you said. But he’s a heavy little rascal. I’ll carry him into his room and get him to the bed.”

  “Who are you?” she asked losing her patience.

  “Didn’t JD tell you? I’m his brother Sam, Sam McIntyre.”

  “There’s two of you?” She looked at him clearly in the halo of the single porch light. She saw it then, the resemblance. Both men were tall, broad shouldered, and arrogant.

  The man chuckled. “Now you sound like our mother. We’re not twins. JD’s a couple of years older than me.”

  Sunny began to speak. But he cut her off. “Don’t let that tender little scene back there fool you.”

  “What are you talking about.” She looked up at the trusting child sleeping so peacefully against the big man’s shoulder. She wished she was that guileless. But she knew what a hard place the world could be. That’s why she would never turn Billy over to the McIntyre family. One had only to look at Billy’s uncles to know he’d not have a warm or secure childhood in their care.

  “You seem like a nice woman. Take my advice. Leave him alone. JD’s not going to fall for some small-town girl with a yen to move up to the big time.”

  “The big time?” Sunny was realizing where this conversation was heading. And she didn’t like it.

  “Yeah,” he said with a notable lack of emotion. “He was dogging you pretty hard in there. Don’t be fooled by all that ‘most beautiful woman in the world’ bullshit. When you put the boy up to calling JD, he was in the middle of his wedding.”

  “He’s married?” Sunny asked aghast. Had she almost just kissed a married man? She wanted to spit in the sand and wipe her mouth. She had no tolerance for those who did not keep their wedding vows. She’d never be part of helping someone break them.

  Billy murmured into Sam’s shoulder. Sam cocked his head. “Let’s get the squirt to bed. Then we can talk.”

  “Sam,” the name was said, deep and low, like a warning. JD walked out of the café. He moved silently up to the ramshackle porch.

  “Looks like big brother’s joining us.” Sam pushed at the slightly opened door with his shoulder.

  “There’s no us. Give me the boy,” Ordered the dark-haired man. JD didn’t wait for his brother’s consent. He easily lifted the child away from Sam and settled him against his own shoulder. “Go back to the Towers. Tell Matt to stall the others, if he can.”

  “Others? Others?” Sunny squeaked. She watched as JD carried Billy into the living room. Sam stayed on the porch. He nodded to her.

  “I’m sure our mother is on her way. And I wouldn’t be surprised, if Leanne isn’t coming with her. If I was you, I’d call it quits. You’re never going to bag him. JD has a sixth sense when it comes to manipulation. He’ll use you up, spit you out, and never look back. I’ve seen him do it too many times before. If you get between him and what he wants, he’ll steamroll right over you.”

  “What are you talking about?” Sunny shook her head to clear it. She realized JD was watching them both through the living room’s window. Thankfully the killing glare on his face was directed at his brother.

  “Coaching the kid to make the call was original, I’ll give you that. But do you really think JD is going to fall for you. I mean, have you seen Leanne?”

  “I did not put Billy up to calling your brother. I still don’t know if I believe he did such a thing,” she said stiffly.

  Sam chuckled again. And whereas the sound was similar in timbre to JD’s, it failed to stir the slightest response from her. In fact, she found it almost irritating.

  “Well, if you don’t believe it, you’re about the only one. The maid accidently turned on the speaker phone as she was trying to mute the thing. The preacher was just getting warmed up when the phone rang. Everybody in that church heard what Billy said. Not only does the Dallas contingent of the Fortune Five Hundred think JD’s been hiding a bastard son or an unwanted nephew. The odds on either are pretty even, I’d say. They think the boy’s mother, that’d be you, keeps JD’s picture and phone number in your underwear drawer. According to Billy, he found them right under your bathing suit. The fact that our baby sister’s name was involved, just makes the whole thing more salacious.”

  Sunny’s face paled. She did keep those things secreted away under her bathing suit in her underwear drawer. But how would Sam McIntyre know that? Nobody knew the link between the McIntyres and Billy. She’d been very careful never to speak of it. Was everything JD said earlier true?

  “Hey, hold on.” He passed an arm around her waist. “You look like you might drop again. Are you sick or something?”

  “Get your hands off her, Sam.” Suddenly JD was there.

  “Hey, no harm, no foul, Ok? I was just trying to keep her from hitting the floor.” He held his hands up.

  “Both of you stop speaking about me like I’m not standing right in front of you,” Sunny said. “I’m not going to faint. I just need both of you to leave.”

  “Not going to happen,” JD drawled. “We still need to talk.”

  “Yeah, well, while you two talk, I’m getting out of here.” Sam walked away. He got halfway across the yard before he turned back to them. “Sunny, don’t forget what I told you.” He drilled her with his eyes for a minute before he disappeared around the corner of the café.

  “Don’t trust him,” JD said. He pulled her through the open door.

  “He’s your brother,” she argued.

  “And that’s supposed to make a difference?” JD shut the door. He leaned one lazy shoulder against it. He cocked an eyebrow and dared her to try to leave.

  Sunny was not staying in this small room alone with him. She’d learned her lesson. She needed to keep the man at a safe distance, if she wanted to survive. Before she ducked into her bedroom, she spoke once more. “He’s your brother. You should trust him. He’s family.”

  “I don’t trust anybody.”

  “You should try.” She propped her hands on her hips. She glared up at him. “See, that’s the reason you’re so… so…”

  “Rich?”

  “No, cynical!” she answered totally aghast. “Everything’s not about money.”

  “Whatever you need to tell yourself.”

  “I don’t need to tell myself anything. I just recognize the truth.”

  He shoved his shoulder away from the closed door and started coming towards her. Sunny felt like the room began shrinking. JD was a big man. But it wasn’t his physical size that was driving all the air and space from the small living room. It was his sheer masculine intensity. Sunny didn’t think she’d ever been around a man so ruthlessly male. She held up a hand.

  “Just stay where you are.”

  “I’m not going to hurt you Sunny. I would never hurt you. Haven’t you been listening to anything I’ve been telling you?”

  The girl nodded her head. “I have. But what you’re saying and what I’m feeling just aren’t lining up too well.”

  JD stopped. His eyes narrowed. “What are you feeling?”

  Sunny’s eyes fell instantly to her scuffed flip flops. There was no way she was going to tell him how he affected her. The beast was already too arrogant. If he found out she’d pined for him over the years. Or how her lower more intimate regions were clenching and heating just because of his proximity. Well, he’d use it to his advantage. She was sure of that. She must keep her wits about her. Losing Billy was not an option. And she could lose him so easily to this rich, powerful man.

  “Don’t do that. Don’t hide from me,” he growled.

  Before she knew his intent, she was gathered into his arms. The whole length of her soft body was dragged up against the hard landscape of his frame. She opened her mouth to catch her breath. And when she did, he claimed possession o
f her lips.

  Later she’d have liked to reassure herself that she’d fought him. That she’d struggled just the teeniest bit against the rough strength of his arms. But that was not the truth. And she could not tell herself such an outlandish lie. The truth was she reveled in every punishing, aching moment of their embrace.

  She moaned under the tender assault of his demanding mouth. Her body arched up upon its own volition as one of his fingers carefully traced the underside of her swelling breast.

  “Please,” she begged in soft surrender.

  “Say it Sunny. Tell me what you want,” he ordered.

  She groaned as he slowly kissed his way down her taunt throat. When he got to the tender juncture where her throat met her shoulder, he nipped at her sensitive skin. She gasped. He slowly blew upon the tiny wound he’d inflicted. His finger edged down the slope where her straining bosom peaked. Sunny’s head twisted back and forth. The agony and anticipation were like nothing she’d ever felt.

  “Tell me,” he uttered the harsh words against her mouth. His breath was ragged and deep. “Tell me you want this. You want me.”

  Sunny felt the hard length of his arousal against her belly. Though she was a woman, full grown, she’d never known such sensual intimacy. His size and strength frightened her. She knew well how a man who lacked self-control could injure a woman. Her own father had killed her best friend. And though JD claimed he would never hurt her, a seed of doubt that had been planted earlier in the café started to grow.

  The girl tried as hard as she could to summon the discipline of will to shove at his wide shoulders. She tried to utter the one word that would have stopped him. She shook her head, but burrowed closer to the carved, muscled planes of his chest.

  “Yes or no? Tell me now.” He plucked at her pebbled nipple.

  A shot of heat telegraphed from her breast down to her core. She felt the gathering moisture there. She ached with a need to be filled. There was a primitive yearning to mate. She wanted to feel truly feminine in a way she never had before. Sunny experienced an agonizing emptiness. One only JD could remedy.

  In a moment of total and complete abandon, she managed to find her voice. “Yes, Yes, always yes,” she murmured against his lips.

  He swept her up into his arms and carried her to the sofa. He sat with her spread out like a banquet over his lap. He reached up and turned off the lamp. Now the room was dark except for the shadowed light from the café’s neon sign. The frosty blue and deep rosy red made a pattern on the old wood floor.

  Sunny opened her eyes. In the dim intimacy, his gray eyes glittered, ferocious with his passion. She knew that same overwhelming desire lit the depths of her eyes as well.

  “You’re sure?” his voice was smoldering and dark. “I won’t be able to stop, if…”

  Sunny licked her lips. She tasted him. The rich, smoky flavor of the liquor he’d just sipped. The spice of his tongue. They combined into an intoxicating flavor. One she could not resist.

  “I’m… I’m sure,” she said. Though she was far from sure she’d told him the truth.

  He nodded. He captured her soft mouth under his. He drank the sweetness of her breath. She was everything he needed. An addiction, he’d never known he possessed. Sunny was like her name. The pure essence of goodness, sweet beyond anything in his experience. But scorching at the same time. He loved her innocence. He coveted her purity. Perhaps the taking of it would heal the brokenness in his own soul.

  JD trailed on finger over the sensitive skin of her stomach. He traced the tiny concave indention of her navel. He smiled against her mouth when her breath caught.

  “Easy Sunny,” he whispered into the shell of her delicate ear. “Relax for me, baby.”

  She tried. She truly did. But every muscle in her body clenched as his searching hand left her belly and traveled further down.

  The hot wet kiss, he drew her into was decadent. He lowered the zip of her jeans. He eased them off her hips. Now his breath stilled in his chest when he saw the elegant lacy lingerie she wore. A dainty little scrap of nothing that was the same succulent ripe-peach color as her skin.

  Sunny arched up. She knew she would die in the next second if he didn’t touch her. She smelled the scent of her own arousal. The odor was rich and fertile, like the still morning ocean. It was a celebration of the creation of life. It was an intimate aroma. One she most likely would have been ashamed of, if she’d been thinking clearly. But she wasn’t thinking at all. She was burning. She tried to guide his hand. She wanted to place it over her throbbing center.

  JD stopped her. “Slow down, Sunny. You’re nowhere near ready for what comes next.”

  “I am,” she rasped.

  “No, you’re not ready yet. But you will be. I’ll make sure,” he said against her soft lips. Then he teased slow, seductive circles on the delicate inner skin of her thigh. The tormenting of his fingers reached higher and higher. Finally, finally the backs of his fingers brushed, ever so carefully, over her silk-covered mound.

  Sunny gasped. Her hips shot up to prolong the contact. “JD, I need… I need.”

  “Shhh, baby, I’m going to give you everything you need,” he said as he eased his hand under the edge of her panties.

  Sunny’s labored breathing increased. She felt the firebrand of his finger as it teased and traced its way down to her center. Her head thrashed side to side as he discovered her.

  “You are still a virgin.”

  The surprise in his voice brought a blush to Sunny’s entire body. Her eyes, which had been closed tight, now flew open. She drowned in the heavily half-lidded look he gave her.

  “It doesn’t matter. I want this. With you,” she confessed.

  “I’ll cherish this gift for the rest of my life,” he told her as he increased the rhythm within her sweet depths.

  Sunny rocked her hips as she felt her release building. Something instinctual within her wanted this man to the exclusion of all else. Rational thought fled. She didn’t care about anything but JD McIntyre and what he was doing to her straining body.

  With his long, hard fingers cradled inside her core, he commanded, “Let go, love. I want to watch you fly.”

  His seductive words and deep probing movements sent her spiraling off into oblivion. A cascade of stars filled the edges of her vision. Fire, scalding and sweet poured over her body. Her entire being was transformed. Before it ended Sunny, slipped off the jagged edge of reality into a black serenity. She woke seconds later to his gentle comfort.

  “Shh, love,” he said as he tenderly brushed riotous taffy-colored hair away from her flushed face. “Take deep, slow breaths. I’ve got you. You’re safe.”

  He began righting her clothing. He drew down the hem of her shirt. His closing of her jeans caused a tiny series of delicious aftershocks. He smiled as her hips bucked, following the movement of his hands.

  “Sit up Sunny,” he ordered.

  “But you didn’t…,” she tried to argue.

  He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. You should get up and walk over to the door. You’re about to have company,” he said. He tilted his head towards the flashing lights of a sheriff’s car coming through the window.

  It was parked in front of Sea Glass Café. Sunny watched as Trey got out. Trinity wasn’t with him. That alone was enough to cause Sunny to frown. She quickly smoothed her clothes. She gathered her hair into a messy knot at the base of her nape. She opened the door, as the officer came up the steps to the house.

  “Where’s Trinity?” The words were out of Sunny’s mouth before she saw the haggard look on the man’s face. “What’s wrong?” she demanded.

  “She’s in labor.”

  “It’s too soon,” Sunny said.

  “I know. And I’m on duty tonight. We’re short handed. There’s no one to take my shift, Sunny.”

  “I’ll go,” the girl said. She didn’t even turn to gather her things. She walked out onto the rickety porch. “I’ve been a birthing coach before.” The
statement wasn’t exactly true. She’d taken the classes. But poor Willie had ended up delivering Billy by C-section. Sunny wasn’t about to tell Trey that fact. “She’ll be just fine.”

  “What about Billy?” Trey asked. Now it was his turn to frown as he looked over her shoulder and saw the big man standing in the living room. “What’s he doing here?”

  “Why would that be any of your business?” JD demanded. His words held a warning.

  “Stop it, both of you. This won’t help Trinity. Can you stay here with Billy?” she asked her question to McIntyre. She still didn’t feel like she knew him. But he was the boy’s uncle. And after what had just transpired on the sofa, Sunny was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

  “I’ll take care of it,” he said. Though his eyes drilled into Trey with a relentless promise of retribution if anything happened to the girl standing in the silvery glow of the porch light.

  “Billy’s a little boy. Not an it.” Sunny was suddenly not so sure leaving her precious son with this man was a good idea. What if he used this opportunity to take the child? “You’ll both be here in the morning?”

  “I’ll take care of it,” JD said again.

  Sunny nodded, relieved. It wasn’t until she was halfway to the hospital that she realized JD had failed to promise her anything. By then she and Trey were almost driving into the Tri-County hospital parking lot.

  They rushed into the small medical building. It was a quiet night. Nobody was in the tiny emergency room. The lights were lowered. The whole interior of the little building looked calm. Except as they went down the short hall that led to the Maternity Ward. Once Sunny got there, she didn’t think about Billy or JD either for that matter, for a very long time.

  There was no nurse at the station desk right outside the ward. That was not a good sign. Sunny knew from experience that even at rural Tri-County there should have been someone to greet them. The empty waiting room was eerie. There was the steady low hum of an old-fashioned water cooler. It stood sentry with an overflowing trash can filled with cone-shaped paper cups. The TV mounted high on the wall was showing a shopping channel. Other than those machines, the place was silent.