Hold on Tight (20 page)

He pulled out of her, groaned as he did so. His cock twitched, missing the contact as he began to kiss his way down her body.

She didn’t have many signs of pregnancy—the telltale line wasn’t running down from her navel yet, and her nipples had barely gone from the pink they’d been to a rosy brown. But her breasts were fuller, for sure—heavy in his hands—and she responded in a way she hadn’t before when he touched them.

Her back arched toward him, pressing her breasts into his hands. “Mmm, that’s nice.”

“Just nice?” He brought his mouth down to a nipple, suckled it hard enough to cause her to jump and moan, and yes, that’s what he wanted. Because
screw
nice.

He was through playing.

“No, not nice, not nice at all.” She wound her hands into his hair, keeping his head there. She was still breathing hard from her first orgasm—it would be the first of many, if he had anything to say about it.

And dammit, he was going to say something about it. He worked his way down her body, the way she had done to his earlier, spread her thighs and ran his tongue along her slick folds.

He practically hummed. “You taste good.”

He’d wanted to do this to her on the plane, in the hotel, in her kitchen, but fuck, it was worth the wait. He buried his face between her legs, heard her begging.

Her hips rose off the floor, her heels dug into the rug and then his shoulders as he licked her until she came again, crying out his name.

Suddenly, he couldn’t wait any longer, climbed up and took her with a long stroke, her sex contracting around him again, hot and wet—and holy shit, he was done.

“Jamie …” He closed his eyes as his orgasm overtook him, his body shuddering with his release. He didn’t move for several moments and when he finally lifted his head, he found her watching him, a small smile on her lips.

“Am I still alive?” she murmured. “Because I feel all floaty.”

“You’re alive. And we’re not done yet.”

“Good, that’s good.” Her hands roamed his back, and his cock hardened. “Hmmm, you are ready.”

“Always for you, Jamie. Always for you.”

Within minutes, he was proving it to her again.

He hadn’t spoken about his past to anyone in a hell of a long time—with another woman ever—and he wasn’t quite ready to spill his guts as he’d promised.

Still, he owed her. She’d told him things, and he never went back on a promise.

But delaying, he was damned good at that.

“Let’s go for a swim,” he said, didn’t wait for an answer before he’d stripped out of his clothes. As he suspected, she was game, followed fast behind him, her clothing flying, and then they hit the water—man, it was still goddamned cold.

He grabbed for her waist—she slipped away from him easily, dove under the dark waves. He waited for her to come up; when she didn’t for a few seconds longer than he was comfortable with, he felt the catch in his throat.

Until, of course, she swept his legs out from under him, leaving him to crash backward. He sputtered as he came up for air.

She was in front of him, treading water. Smiling.

“Damned Air Force isn’t supposed to teach you to swim,” he said, and she laughed and swam away from him.

He caught her halfway up the beach, swung her into his arms and managed to get them both up to the deck before the crowd of partygoers walked in front of the house.

“That was close.” He placed her down and shoved the hair off his face. “I’ve got some towels here.”

He reached into the bin next to the surfboards and pulled out a towel. He’d much rather keep her naked, but she was shivering.

He’d get her dry and then make her wet. A damned good plan. And as he rubbed her shoulders with the towel, he nuzzled his face into her neck. She moved toward him, her bare body against his, and yeah, talking wasn’t on his mind anymore.

She looked at him, the light from the deck casting a soft glow over her face. “There must be so many women who want to be with you.”

He didn’t let go of her, even as she attempted to wrap the towel around both of them. And yeah, it was time.

He heard his accent thicken when he told her, “There was a woman once … and then, after that, there were a lot of them.”

“She was someone special.”

“Yes. And I did everything I could not to let her get away.”

“But she did.”

“She died.”

PJ didn’t say anything, just tugged the towel a little tighter around them in an attempt to cover his shoulders. And so he continued, the words coming out in a thick rush of emotion. “We’d been dating from high school—sophomore year. She wasn’t exactly my family’s first pick for me. She was pretty wild, her family was too—and fuck, it was fun.”

“She was your first love.”

“Yeah. My family’s pretty wealthy. They had plans for me that didn’t include falling in love with Emeline and enlisting in the Navy. They didn’t understand me back then. Still don’t, I guess.”

“Tell me more about Emeline.”

“You really want to know?”

“No, because I’m jealous. But yes, because she was so important to you.”

Her honesty nearly killed him. “We’d been together for two years, just graduated, when we found out she had bone cancer. And so we got married. We were married for two months before she died, and I stayed with her every single second of her illness. When she passed, I enlisted, because I didn’t know what the hell else to do.”

“Saint, I’m sorry. I can’t imagine what that must’ve been like.”

He’d been seventeen, in love. Married. Watching the girl he loved slowly dying and not being able to do a damned thing about it.

Emeline had been so pretty, so fucking strong. When she died, he was sure he’d never find his strength again. The Navy had given him a chance to show off his physical strength—but BUD/S, that had truly been hell. He’d tried to rely solely on his body, with his mental game shot to shit, and it hadn’t worked. In order to pull his ass out of the fire, he’d had to get his head back on straight.

“Was she pretty?” PJ was asking.

“Yeah, she was.”

“You’d still be with her today.”

“I don’t know. I’d like to think that, but I sure as shit can’t predict the future. I had no idea I’d end up doing what I’m doing … or sitting here with a woman who a couple days ago wanted to slit my throat.”

That made her smile. “I didn’t want to—you were being …”

“What?” He moved his body as close as possible to hers.

“Insolent. And I was simply trying to make sure you were all right.”

“I’m not okay.” He lowered his head to murmur against her neck. “You going to help me?”

She would, let him know by simply threading her fingers through his hair. “I don’t know what to do with myself. I left Africa because I couldn’t figure that out—I’d hoped it would be different here. But I barely have any money in the bank. No place to live. When they took me into GOST, they cleaned out my apartment. Anything I once had is gone, except for a few weapons and some clothing. That should matter, but when I’m here with you, like this, it doesn’t.”

“You’re starting over. And I told myself that if anyone ever came into my life who made me feel the way Emeline did, I’d fight like hell to keep her. And I’m prepared to fight, PJ—make no mistake about it.”

With that, he brought his mouth down on hers in a long, hot kiss that had her dropping the towel she’d been holding, leaving both of them naked in the semi-privacy under his deck.

And apparently, he felt that moment had come.

“I want you in a bed this time,” he murmured after he’d pulled back from kissing her; PJ struggled to catch her breath, and her senses. Because her knees had been pretty much knocked from underneath her, and if Saint’s arms weren’t around her, she’d be a puddle in the sand.

A highly contented puddle.

Although she was long dried off, the wind still brought a chill to her body, and in Saint’s arms, she was cold and hot, and she buried her face against him as another group of beach walkers passed by, far enough away and so into their own rowdiness that it wasn’t a problem.

Her breasts pressed his hard chest, his thighs were like iron against her and his arousal felt like velvet steel when it rubbed her belly. She moaned into his mouth, tried to remember how long it had been since she’d actually kissed someone, and couldn’t.

But she knew no one else had ever kissed her like this, like they owned her. Saint had everything it took to back up that claim—and more.

It both scared and thrilled her.

“You’re thinking,” he murmured against her mouth. “No more. Not now.”

As if to help her along, his hand dipped between her legs, fingers stroking her sex, making it wet and hot and causing her to writhe against him, toes digging into the sand as she struggled to remain upright. He certainly wasn’t dragging her to a bed, but he was taking her—there was no doubt about that.

His name escaped her lips, a whisper at first and then louder as the pad of his thumb found her clit and didn’t let up.

“Yeah, that’s better, Patricia Jane … keep going.”

“You … keep … going,” she managed, and God, he did, first with a finger inside of her and then he added a second and a third, moved them inside of her until she thought she’d scream. And maybe she did—she lost track of everything, including her name, as the familiar tightening in her groin began. She was so wet, and he was kissing her neck, sucking lightly as though wanting to mark her.

He was making her his, and that was all it took to push her over the edge. She came, hard around his fingers, and he was whispering things to her—sweet and dirty words that made her murmur back to him, calling him
baby
, and whispering,
hold me
, and she never wanted this to end.

“Come on, let’s get you inside—into that bed.”

She couldn’t think of any reasons to protest as he carried her up the deck stairs, slung her bag over his shoulder and brought her into the house.

It was only once they were inside the silence of the house that they heard the beeping coming from her bag.

“Your phone?” he asked.

“Shit. I keep forgetting it exists.”

He lowered her to the ground and handed her the bag. She fished inside and pulled out the shiny new cell phone she’d bought two days earlier. New number, new start. But when she called her voice mail and heard Jamie’s voice telling her, albeit calmly, about the explosion, she felt the familiar pangs of panic embrace her like an old friend.

“Everything all right?” Saint asked. She handed him the phone so he could listen to the message himself. He did and immediately dialed the number of the last caller. “The call was made from Chris’s phone,” he explained, and then, “Hey, what the hell’s going on?” to Chris when he answered.

Saint listened for a few minutes, mouthed, “Jamie’s okay, she’s sleeping,” and then said, “Do you need us to do anything?”

She moved away from him to stare outside. It had to be close to six in the morning—she’d stopped wearing watches a long time ago—and adrenaline began to buzz through her.

Someone was threatening her baby sister again—there was no way she’d sit tight for that.

“Okay, Chris has her someplace safe,” Saint said when he hung up. He handed her the cell phone and she held on to it.

They were still naked, in the semi-dark of Saint’s living room, and he folded her into his arms. “She’s okay, PJ. We can go see her, if you want.”

“No, that’s okay.”

“Chris is the best person to keep her safe,” he continued. “He loves your sister.”

“I know.” She’d seen it in Chris’s eyes when they’d met in Africa, noticed the way he’d watched Jamie, for just a second too long. “She doesn’t want me around, says I’m too volatile.”

“Are you?” His blue eyes glinted when she turned into his arms and he stared down at her.

“Sometimes. Maybe.”

“You’ll get better. Hang on to the phone.” Again, he picked her up and carried her up the stairs, sweeping away any imminent worries.

There was nothing she could do right now anyway—losing herself further into Saint seemed to be the best plan. And the only plan he would allow.