Gansett Island Boxed Set Books 1-16 (Gansett Island Series)

by Marie Force

  Jenny squirmed under him, seeking relief of some kind or another.

  “Easy,” he whispered. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  It was the perfect thing for him to say. They had no time limit, no one waiting for either of them.

  He bent his head over her chest.

  “Wait.”

  His forehead landed on her sternum. “What’s wrong?”

  “You’re not married or anything, are you?”

  “Hell no. I wouldn’t be here doing this with you if I had someone else. What about you?”

  “Not married. Or anything.”

  “Now that we’ve got that cleared up, can we get back to what we were doing?”

  Though she wanted nothing more than to get back to what they’d been doing—because it was about to get even more interesting—she felt the need to clarify one thing. “That’s not exactly true.”

  “Which part?”

  “The ‘or anything’ part. I’ve been dating. Some. Here and there. Nothing serious, though.”

  “Great. Glad we cleared that up. Green light to proceed?” As he spoke, his lips left a trail of fire over the tops of her breasts.

  “One more thing.”

  His deep sigh relayed a world of frustration. “I’m listening.”

  She was almost afraid to say it because she didn’t want him to leave. Not yet anyway. “I won’t have sex with you.”

  “Who said I wanted to have sex with you?”

  Jenny raised her hips a fraction of an inch, putting her sex in direct contact with his straining cock and drawing a tortured hiss from him. “You did.”

  His gruff chuckle made her smile. “I suppose I did, and I suppose I might’ve tried for a home run if you hadn’t set me straight. But for now,” he said, kissing his way to the valley between her breasts, “this is more than enough for me.”

  Jenny wondered if it would be enough for her and berated herself for taking the home run off the table. If only she wasn’t so certain she’d hate herself in the morning…

  When his lips closed around her nipple, she became quite certain she’d hate herself in the morning for saying no.

  She grabbed handfuls of his long hair, holding on for dear life as he licked and sucked and bit. Christ almighty, the pain of his teeth clamping down on her sensitive flesh nearly finished her right off. He kept it up until she was nearly delirious from the pleasure, and then he shifted his attention to the other side.

  The tight grip she kept on his hair had to be hurting him, but he didn’t say anything, and she didn’t dare let go. Jenny opened her eyes to look up at the star-laden sky as she arched her back, wanting to get closer to the heated torment of his mouth.

  He stopped suddenly, his head dropping again to her chest.

  “What’s wrong?” Jenny tuned in to the heavy sounds of his breathing and the lap of the waves against the shore.

  “Do you want me to stop?”

  “Not particularly.”

  “So it would be okay if I kissed you here?” His lips landed on her belly, making her skin quiver.

  “Mmm.”

  “How about here?” he asked, moving lower.

  “That’s good, too.” I’m not going to let him do that, am I? Apparently, I am. Oh my God, I have to put a stop to this madness. That’s what it is. Utter madness.

  Alex untied the bows at her hips, and her bathing suit bottoms fell away, leaving her completely naked in the moonlight.

  “Is this legal on Gansett Island?” Jenny muttered.

  Alex laughed and continued to kiss her belly as he settled between her legs. “Do you honestly care?”

  “I don’t do this.”

  “Don’t do what?”

  “This. With men I barely know or men I just met or well, anyone.”

  “Well, that’s a damned shame. Why not?”

  “That’s an awfully long story, and this isn’t the time or the place.”

  “I wouldn’t mind hearing your awfully long story sometime, but you’re right about the time and place. I’ve got other things on my mind at the moment.”

  “I can’t.” But even as she moaned the words, she tightened her grip on his hair. She wasn’t sure if she planned to pull him closer or push him away.

  “Yes, you can.” The rasp of his whiskers against her belly made a liar out of her as she arched into him, trying to get closer.

  Fully aware of his destination as he kissed his way down her body, Jenny knew she had to stop him now, while she still could. She’d had sex a couple of times since Toby died, but she’d never allowed this. It seemed too intimate an act to do with a guy she didn’t love. So why was she allowing Alex’s broad shoulders to part her legs or his big, rough hands to cup her bottom to position her the way he wanted her?

  For the longest time, he only hovered, as if giving her a final chance to truly say no. She didn’t say no. She didn’t say anything, because her brain refused to function properly. By the time he pressed his tongue into her folds, she was on the verge of begging him to hurry up.

  Toby had been good at this. Alex was, too. He licked and sucked and bit… Jesus… And then he pushed two fingers into her, and she came hard, her legs shaking violently. He backed off, but only for a second before he was back for more, starting all over again as if he hadn’t just delivered one of the most powerful orgasms of her life. In her right mind, she’d be wondering how he’d managed to keep the encounter entirely sand-free, but he’d done that as smoothly as he’d done everything else so far.

  “I want another one,” he said in that raspy voice.

  “I can’t.”

  “You said that before, and you did.” He flexed his fingers deep inside her and bent his head to prove her wrong.

  Usually she was too sensitive after the first one to go for two, but he powered through the sensitivity and had her coming again less than five minutes later. Utter insanity.

  Apparently, satisfied with himself and his handiwork, Alex crawled up her body while keeping his fingers planted deep inside her. He sucked hard on her left nipple, making her moan, before continuing to her mouth, where he kissed her with deep thrusts of his tongue, which bore her flavor.

  “You are so fucking hot.” His coarse words, uttered against her lips, made her tingle all over. “Mmm,” he whispered, stroking his fingers through the flood of moisture between her legs, “someone likes dirty talk. I’ll have to remember that for next time.”

  Next time…

  Those two words finally snapped her out of the sexual stupor he’d seduced her into. She pushed at his shoulders, wanting him off her immediately. Naturally, he resisted her efforts to dislodge him, flexing his fingers to remind her he was still inside her, as if she needed the reminder. “Please. Stop.”

  He immediately withdrew his fingers from between her legs and rolled off her onto his back. They stayed like that, side by side, breathing hard as the heavy night air washed over them.

  Jenny’s legs continued to tremble as her core pulsed with the aftereffects of two scorching orgasms. Her eyes burned with tears that she refused to shed. She was thirty-seven years old and had never done anything even remotely close to this. She had no reason to feel ashamed and yet… Somehow that was exactly how she felt.

  “Are you okay?”

  He had to go and be sweet to her, which only made her feel worse. “I’m fine.”

  “What’s wrong?” Alex raised himself up on one elbow so he could look down at her.

  “Nothing.”

  “Are you having regrets?”

  “Well, yeah. Duh.”

  “Why? We didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “We barely know each other, and we’re rolling around on the beach like a scene out of From Here to Eternity.”

  His soft chuckle was as sexy as every other damned thing he did. The man was truly a walking, talking example of sex on a stick.

  Jenny sat up, covering her breasts with her arm as she felt around in the dark for her bikini top or bottoms
, preferably both.

  “Things are kind of screwed up for me right now,” he said, “and I sort of like the fact that you don’t know anything more about me than my first name and what I do for a living. But I’ll tell you my last name, if you really want to know.”

  “No.” The word was out of her mouth before Jenny could take a second to think it through. “If you tell me your last name, then I’ll be tempted to call my friends tomorrow and find out everything about you. And that’ll ruin everything. You’re Alex Lawnmower to me.”

  Laughing, he said, “Okay, Jenny Lighthouse, but there’s one other thing about me you already know.”

  “What’s that?”

  He cupped her bare breast as he kissed her. “I’m hot for you, and I want more.”

  She shook her head as she pushed him and his hand away. “No more. This was a one-time moment of madness, never to be repeated.”

  “You’ll take away my will to live if you tell me we can never do this again.”

  “Don’t make jokes about dying. Not to me, anyway.”

  “Why not?”

  She bit her lip and shook her head. Telling him why not would change everything. “When you said things are screwed up, you don’t mean because of a woman, do you?”

  “Yes, but not in the sense you mean. It’s family stuff, not romance stuff.”

  Strangely comforted to know he wasn’t running from a bad relationship or worse—a bad marriage—Jenny located her top and tied it around her neck.

  The brush of his fingers on her back tying the other part gave her goose bumps and made her nipples tighten with interest. Down, girls. The party is over.

  His lips were soft against her shoulder, making her wish she was someone different, someone who could have a good time with a hot guy and not hate herself for it the next day. “It was more fun taking it off than it was putting it back on.”

  Jenny smiled in the darkness. He was sweet and funny and sexy and so much more than she was ready for. She’d only recently decided to give dating a whirl. Rolling around naked on the beach with a guy she’d only met that morning was way too far outside her comfort zone.

  He helped her to locate the other half of her bathing suit, kept his back to her while she got dressed, shook out the towels and walked her back to the lighthouse without touching her again.

  Jenny wasn’t sure if she was relieved or disappointed that he’d kept his hands to himself. At the door, she turned to him, his arresting face illuminated by a floodlight. “I’ll, um, I guess I’ll see you when you cut the grass again.”

  His confident smile unnerved her. “If not before.”

  “Alex, really, I’m not in a good place for this sort of thing—”

  He silenced her with a deep kiss that made a total and complete liar out of her. “See you around, Jenny Lighthouse.” He let her go so suddenly that she had to reach for the door to steady herself as he handed the towels to her.

  She held on to the door handle while he started the motorcycle and drove off in a cloud of dust. Her mother had always warned Jenny and her sisters to be wary of men who preferred motorcycles. Alex was exactly the kind of guy her mother had worried about—a bit reckless, a bit devil-may-care and a whole lot of trouble.

  Jenny planned to take her mother’s advice and stay far, far away from him.

  By the end of the long, emotional day, Maddie was completely drained and feeling like a jerk for making such a big deal out of not being pregnant when she hadn’t even wanted to be pregnant.

  She cringed when she recalled her breakdown at Syd’s. Like she had any right to be mourning an unwanted pregnancy in front of her friend, who was going to such enormous lengths to get pregnant after losing two children in an accident. “You’re one hell of a good friend,” she muttered to the darkness.

  Her kids had refused to go to bed, and, sensing she was teetering on the edge of losing it completely, Mac had sent her outside with a glass of wine to decompress while he wrestled them into bed.

  I have so much to be thankful for, she thought as she rocked on the deck that overlooked the ocean in the distance. Two amazingly bright and beautiful kids, her wonderful husband, who was so tuned in to her he could tell when she needed a break, a lovely home, her mom and sister close by and happily settled with men who adored them, her adorable niece Ashleigh, a future stepfather she’d come to love, amazing in-laws and the kind of friends she used to dream of having…

  With so much happiness in her life, what right did she have to be so decimated by such a silly thing as a false-alarm pregnancy?

  “You have no right at all to feel this way. None.”

  “Talking to yourself, love?” Mac asked as he joined her on the deck, dressed in only a pair of low-riding pajama pants that left his exquisitely muscular chest on full display.

  Maddie took a long, hungry look at that most excellent man chest and added it to her gratitude list. That chest and the man who owned it were all hers, and he was the best thing in a life full of amazing things. “I’m the only one who wants to hear my woes today.”

  “I want to hear your woes every day. Are you going to tell me what has you so wound up and weepy?”

  “It’s so stupid, and I feel like such a jerk because I bawled all over Syd today when she’s going through so much. I’m an idiot and a bad friend.”

  “Madeline… You’re going to piss me off saying something like that. Who cooked dinner for Joe and Janey at least twice a week while she was on bed rest? Who’s stepped up for Laura to help with Holden while she’s been so sick? Who helped take care of Buddy while Luke and Syd were on the mainland? Who has Ashleigh as much as her mother does? Come on. You’re an awesome friend and sister and aunt and sister-in-law and cousin-in-law.”

  He pulled her up and slid into her chair, settling her on his lap with his arms around her. Nuzzling her neck, he said, “You’re the most awesome wife and mother. You’re the glue that holds our whole unruly crew together, and everyone knows it.”

  Surrounded by him and his all-consuming love for her, Maddie was finally able to confess her deepest sorrow. “I wanted that baby we’re apparently not having.”

  “I know you did. Shockingly, I did, too.”

  She raised her head from his shoulder. “You did? Really?”

  “How could I not want another one just like the two we already have? They’re so freaking amazing, and what’s one more in the midst of mayhem?”

  “I thought you were mad about it.”

  “Why in the world would I be mad when it was my fault in the first place? You were drunk, I was sober, and I forgot the condom. What right did I have to be mad about anything?”

  “Still… I didn’t think it was what you wanted.”

  “You know how I feel about this island and crazy-ass pregnancies, especially after what just happened with Janey and P.J. That’s the part I was freaked out about. Actually having another baby? Not so much.” The chair rocked slowly under them, stirring the heavy air around them. “Goddamn, it’s hot.”

  “So hot. There’s not even the slightest breeze.”

  “Supposed to last another couple of days,” Mac said.

  “Thank God for central air.”

  “I was thinking we ought to shut it off in our room and have sweaty heat-wave sex.”

  For the first time in hours, Maddie laughed. “Leave it to you to want that.”

  “Come on. You know you want it, too. We can work around the monthly thing.”

  “The monthly thing was gone as fast as it came.”

  “Wait… so it only lasted a day?”

  “Less than, actually.”

  “I don’t want you to think I’m overly obsessed with what goes on down there, but doesn’t it usually last a lot longer than that?”

  “Yeah. It’s probably the heat or something.”

  “Or something.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “What if you really are pregnant, and the one-day period was a false alarm?”
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  The possibility hit Maddie like a lightning bolt to the heart. “That doesn’t happen. Does it?”

  “Might be time to pee on a stick, my love.”

  All of a sudden, tears were flowing down her cheeks in a flood that couldn’t be contained.

  “Hmmm, nonstop crying, emotional ups and downs…” Mac cupped her breast, making her startle from the almost shocking sensation that tore through her from the simple caress. “Sensitive breasts… I’m not a detective, but it seems like I might’ve witnessed these signs once before.”

  “Don’t get my hopes up. I can’t bear to not be pregnant twice in two days.”

  “Tomorrow we’ll buy a test and get an answer.” He kissed her neck and jaw, blazing a trail to her lips. “Since there’s nothing we can do to resolve this dilemma tonight, how about I try to get your mind off it with some sweaty heat-wave sex?”

  “That might help as long as you don’t care if I cry the whole time.”

  “As long as you’re crying from the pleasure, I’m fine with a few tears.” He kissed her and patted her bottom to get her to stand. “Stay here. I’ll be right back.”

  While he was gone, Maddie leaned against the rail, looking down on the yard as she thought of the possibility Mac had suggested. It was odd for her period to only last a day and not even a full day at that.

  Mac returned carrying the handheld baby monitor, which he set on one of the teak tables that was part of their deck set. Then he set about removing the pads from two of the lounge chairs. He put them on the deck and held out his hand to her.

  “Right here?”

  “Right here.”

  She snuggled up to him on the makeshift bed, resting her head on his outstretched arm.

  “I hate to see you sad about anything,” he said.

  “I’m sorry. I’m being crazy, and I know it—”

  He kissed her soundly, silencing her words as much as her worries. “You’re not crazy. You’re adorable, and I love you.”

  “Don’t be nice to me, or I’ll start crying again.”

  “Fine then. You’re a shrew and a hag, and I still love you.”