Closer Than A Brother (12 page)

“Can I have a piece of paper and a pen please,” he asked of no particular nurse.

“What are you doing?” Danielle asked.

He squeezed her hand tighter so she couldn’t get away from him. He wrote a quick note and handed it to the nurse. “Could you please give this to the Stovers in room two ten? Thanks so much,” he said, dropping his hand to the small of Danielle’s back, and leading her to the elevators.

“What did your note say?” She asked as the doors closed behind them.

“We’ll be over later tonight,” he said capturing her lips with his again.

Chapter Eighteen

Her eyes were still closed, but she smiled against his pillow when she felt his warm hand slide down her naked back. She lay in his bed after a first round of mind-numbing sex. “What are you doing, Shane?” she asked mumbling. She felt herself dozing, her body well relaxed.

“Loving you,” he whispered against her right shoulder, before leaving a trail of butterfly kisses up her neck and next to her ear. She giggled at the tickle of his warm voice against her skin.

“I’m ready for round two, sweetheart,” he said positioning his body over hers. His erection nestled against her butt. She elevated her body only slightly so he could slip his hands under her. He slid his fingers over her responsive breasts. Her nipples stiffened against his palms.

“You know I can’t resist this position,” she moaned her pleasure as he continued to work her nipples. She felt her center moistened as his cock jerked against her ass. “I think you like it too.” She chuckled softly.

“I like everything about you, baby.” He lowered his head over her shoulder to take her lips in a hot kiss. “I want you, Danielle,” he breathed against her lips.

“Take me, Shane.” The words barely escaped her mouth before he entered her from behind. His cock hard and long found her pussy without hesitation. Her forehead fell against the pillow as he worked her to orgasm, doggy-style. Pumping in and out of her his hands between her breasts and the bed, she cried her satisfaction. She lifted her hips slightly to allow him better access. She felt him go deeper inside of her. He slid a hand from her breast down her stomach to her clit. Fondling her from this position made her pant at the sensation. “Yes! Shane, just like that!” The blinding orgasm hit her hard and fast. Her stomach hit the bed trapping his hands, one still on her breast the other on her sensitive bud. He worked at her until she couldn’t come any more. When she lost control under his skillful hand she heard him groan his release before he collapsed on top of her. She welcomed the weight of him on her body. He rolled to the side of her collecting her naked body in his arms. “Are you okay?” he asked, spreading his fingers over her stomach pressing her toward him.

He kissed the back of her neck and she smiled. “Mm-hmm. Why do you ask?”

“You’re shaking,” he commented against her skin. She barely noticed it, but he was right. She was experiencing light tremors throughout her body. She sighed.

“What’s wrong?” he asked. She heard the concern in his voice.

“It’s nothing—just…aftershocks.”

She snoozed in the crook of his arm and whined when he moved. “Where are you going?” she asked when he moved away from her.

“I need to use the restroom.”

She opened one eye and noted it was dark out. “Damn it, Shane, what time is it?” She sat up in bed.

They’d made love three times since they’d come back to his house. They napped in between, but she hadn’t expected to be here this late. She could just imagine the story she would have to come up with to tell Brandi and Jason. She glanced at the clock on his side table. “It’s eight o’clock!” She threw the sheets back from her body. “We have to go!”

“Whoa, wait,” he said dropping back onto the bed with her. “Jason and Brandi aren’t expecting us over there until tomorrow.”

“You told them…” She stopped and watched the slow grin slide across his face. “What did that note really say?”

He laughed getting back up from the bed. “It said don’t expect us tonight,” he said shutting the bathroom door before the pillow she whipped across the room could get him.

* * * *

“Are you hungry?” she asked lazily after their fourth round.

“Absolutely,” he growled against her neck.

“Stop it.” She giggled. “I’m completely sore. I cannot go another time. I’m too old for all this sexing.” She swatted at his hand tickling the inside of her leg.

“I could go get Chinese if you’d like?”

“No,” she said more quickly than she wanted.

He lifted his head to look at her. The small bedside table light did little to light the room. “I thought you liked Chinese?”

“Could you order in?” she said, not wanting to give the real reason.

“I most certainly can.” He teased her. “Tell me why you don’t want me to go out and get something.” She rolled her eyes at him. He kissed at her jaw finding her lips. “Tell me,” he said, his voice dropping to an octave she knew to be dangerous.

“I don’t want you to leave,” she admitted against his torturous lips.

“Trust me, I don’t ever want to leave you, Danielle.” He kissed at her passionately and she moaned her pleasure.

She put a hand to his chest. “No. Hey stop that—distracting me with kisses and sweet words. My stomach is still rumbling. You must feed me, Shane. I need my strength.”

“You’re right. We have a long night ahead of us.”

“Oh no.” She laughed swatting at his naked rear. As he left the bed she fell back on soft sheets staring at his ceiling. Her body satisfied, her heart full.
I’m in love.
Like it or not. She couldn’t hide from this anymore.
And I don’t want to
.

* * * *

“Pizza is on the way,” he said entering his room.

She lay on her stomach her face turned toward the doorway. Her eyes were closed.
She fell asleep.
A smile crept across his face. She looked gorgeous in his bed.

He ran fingers down his face and ambled across the room toward her. Sitting on the edge of the bed, he tried to resist the urge to open the bedside table drawer, where he had hidden the small black box for the last year. He had tried not to think about the ring he spent a month’s salary on, or the women he bought it for. He looked over his shoulder at her, still peacefully sleeping next to him. He quietly opened his bedside table drawer and fished out the black box tucked in the back. He flipped it opened and looked at the sparkling, two carat marquise diamond, and round diamond side stones.

The three diamonds represent the past, present, and the future he wanted with Danielle. He should have tried to push things with her. He wasn’t hesitant at all about how he felt for her. He didn’t know what else to say or do to prove that to her. She knew how he felt. He clicked the box shut on a sigh and slid it back in the drawer. He checked over his shoulder once again to see if Danielle was still sleep. The sound of the doorbell down stairs indicated that the pizza had arrived. He slid off the bed silently and slipped from the room clicking the door shut behind him.

* * * *

She waited for the door to shut before she opened her eyes. She had been lightly sleeping when he entered the room, but when he sat down on the edge of the bed and started rooting around in his bedside table drawer she’d stirred from her sleep and decided to stay quiet to see what he was up to. He hadn’t noticed she was awake because he had been too engrossed in whatever it was in his hand. She caught sight of the black box before he slid it back in the drawer. Everything in her wanted to roll over and throw open that drawer.
Will he propose?

She sat up in bed pulling her knees against her naked chest. If he did, she thought she knew what her answer would be. She just had to wait and see what his intentions were. She slid from his bed and disappeared in his bathroom before the temptation to open that drawer consumed her.

Chapter Nineteen

The night of pizza and love making finally ended with them in a tangled mess of limbs. Skin to skin, they fell asleep in each other’s arms.

The sound of Shane’s cell phone ringing on his dresser across the room woke her with and abrupt start. “Shane,” she whispered nudging at his arm.

“Hmm?” he groaned.

“You’re phone.”

“Let it ring,” he growled pulling her closer to him.

“What time is it?” she asked trying to pull her body into a sitting position. He stopped her efforts kissing the side of her neck. “Honestly, who cares?” he mumbled against her neck.

“Don’t you have to work?” She laughed.

“I’m on the night shift.”

“Which night?” she said hitting his arm. “You haven’t worked a shift since I came home.”

“I have personal time. Why do you ask?” She noted his hand slip beneath the covers as he begun a tickling assault on her stomach. “Stop it!” she yelped.

“Are you trying to get rid of me?”

“No, not at all. I just didn’t want you skipping out on work because of me.”

“I would do anything for you,” he said bringing his full attention to her. His hand stilled lying flat against her abdomen. “You know that, right?” he asked again.

She stared into his bright eyes, raw with unhidden emotion. She brought a hand to his hard-set jaw, directing his face to hers. She answered him with a soft kiss. She felt the butterflies in her stomach as he deepened the kiss.

She couldn’t remember the last time a man caused her to feel like this. In the last year and a half since she had first seen him again, Shane had given her so many tear-jerking emotions. No one had ever made her feel desire and denial, fear and love, loneliness and sadness being without him, and this feeling now, warm and safe, contentment to be here in his arms. She welcomed the feel of his hands on her body. She was already feeling her body responding to his caresses. Never had she spent a whole afternoon and evening, and night and morning like this with any man, and now here she was intertwined with Shane Matthews—of all people—enjoying and wanting more with each passing minute. She wanted and needed to feel him inside of her again and again. Not just sexually, but emotionally. She was in love with him. She needed to tell him. He needed to know how she felt. As he entered her warm center, she signed his name.

“Shane, mmm.”

“Tell me baby, what is it?” he asked, pumping her slowly. She lay on her back enjoying the feel of his weight on her body.

“I love…the way that feels,” she breathed closing her eyes from his probing stare.

“Danielle,” he said with a sound of pleading in his tone. She knew it was lame, and it wasn’t what she had meant to say.
Why am I making this more difficult than it has to be?
She wrapped her legs around his waist allowing him to work in and out of her, his rhythm picking up speed.

“Tell me!” he demanded, thrusting quicker, deeper.

“Oh yes, please keep going, don’t stop,” she panted, her hand reaching up to grab the rails on his head board. He grabbed at her legs, unwrapping them from his waist. He let one fall to the bed and gently lifted the other so that her heel was facing the ceiling. He slowed his rhythm.

“What are you doing?” She opened her eyes, her breaths shallow. He pulled his length from her until the mushroomed head was at her entrance.

“Tell me, Danielle.” He bore a hole into her, his eyes a turbulent gray-blue.

“What!” she exclaimed, turning her gaze from him.

“Damn it! You know what I’m talking about you…you weren’t going to tell me that you love…this,” he said, letting his bulbous head enter her before he pulled it from her again.

“Stop teasing, Shane. This is not funny,” she said, hating that he had her at the point of begging. She almost moved her pussy toward his dick.

“Then don’t
you
play with
me
.” His voice was sharp with warning.

She closed her eyes, knowing what he wanted to hear. Knowing that she felt for him what he wanted her to feel, but she didn’t know how to say it.

“Look at me.” His words softened. She opened her eyes and looked at him through tear brimmed eyes.

“This should not be this hard,” he whispered. “I’m in love with you.”

She blinked and the tears escaped her eyes. Her lips trembled as he released her ankle letting her leg fall back to the bed. He rested between her legs taking her trembling lips with his. “I. Am. In. Love. With. You,” he said again each word breaking through her heart as her body responded to his gentle kisses applied to various parts of her face, neck, and collarbone and hot caresses to her stomach and thighs.

He reclaimed her mouth before entering her in one swift movement causing her body to arch against his. A strong arm moved under her body, supporting her weight as he worked her hard and slow. She closed her eyes at the sheer pleasure of his body. The workings of a fine orgasm moved over her as her body started to vibrate and the stars burst behind her eyes and she caught her breath. “Ahhh! Shane!”

“Tell me, baby,” he said, between gritted teeth. She opened her eyes to look at him she could tell he was ready to release with her. “Danielle,” he moaned her name—the one word plea for her love. She placed both hands on the sides of his face, as he continued to work her body. “Shane, baby…I love you.”

He closed his eyes, leaning his forehead against hers as she captured his mouth for a sensual kiss as they climaxed together.

Chapter Twenty

She woke alone. She immediately missed the feeling of his body—the warm, safe feel of his embrace. The way he kissed at her neck and ear as she dozed. She missed him and everything that came with him. She cleared her throat and called out to him.

“Shane!” She waited for him to reply.
Hmm, what the hell?

She sat up bringing his sheets and comforter with her. She looked at the bedside table, three o’clock in the afternoon.
I have to get to Brandi and Jason’s house sometime this week.
What they must think of her. She slid from his bed and reached for a red T-shirt he had thrown across a chair. Sliding it over her naked body she quickly used the restroom and went in search of Shane.