In Too Deep (22 page)

The referee appeared in front of
them, red-faced and harried. “The other bloke’s gone off field
already, but sorry, mate, you’re out too.”

West raised his palms. “No
worries. Just let me make sure the lady he hit is okay.”

The ref nodded. “Couple of
minutes, then.”

Around him the crowd murmured and
a few people pointed over his shoulder, wide-eyed and whispering,
but West blocked the rising chatter of voices and strode toward
Piper. Spotting her mud-covered legs and the crown of her short
hair sticking up in wet spikes, the urge to scoop her up and cradle
her into his chest kicked his heart into a mad gallop.

Her head lifted, those clear hazel
eyes zeroing in on his. Could she see what he thought? How much he
wanted her, how deep she undermined every wall of resistance he
threw up? He froze, locked in place. Before he could take another
step, a hand grabbed his forearm. He started, so caught up in his
single-minded purpose to reach Piper he’d been unaware of anyone
else nearby.

“
Ryan.”

There were only two people who
ever called him Ryan and only one of them still held the flat,
monotone drawl of a Californian accent.

His head whipped around. “Ma? What
the hell are you doing here?”

Steady blue eyes looked back at
him. Eyes that hadn’t changed, although his mother’s rosy skin had
wrinkles, and her hair—in his memory glossy brown and falling in
waves to her waist—now cut in a sensible bob, streaked with fine
threads of dulled silver. “We need to talk, Ryan.”

Tension ratcheted up his spine.
Holy hell—his father! What would he think of Claire’s sudden
presence back in Oban? Adding a heart attack to Bill’s kidney
issues when he came face to face with his ex-wife wasn’t something
West wanted to contemplate. “You need to leave before Dad finds out
you’re here.”

“
Bill already knows I’m here. I
went straight to him when I got off the ferry this morning. I’m not
leaving and the three of us need to talk.”

He raked a hand through his hair.
This had turned into his year for women showing up unwanted and
refusing to bloody leave. “I’m busy—right in the middle of a rugby
game in case you hadn’t noticed.”

His ma cut him a sharp glance.
“Looks to me your game was over the moment you pounded the Reynolds
boy.”

“
He’s not a boy, he’s a hundred
kilo wanker who slammed into my—” dammit, she was not his woman,
would
never
be his “—into Piper.”

Why had his brain fixated on this
when his mother, who he hadn’t seen since he was twenty-one, stood
two feet away? And, what—Bill
knew
she was here?

His father lumbered across the
field toward them, a thunderous expression on his face. This just
kept getting better. A frickin’ Westlake reunion. “Don’t tell me
Del is here too.”

“
No, Del’s still in LA, but…” His
mother’s voice trailed off the same instant he sensed Piper behind
him.

Sidestepping, West shook his head
at them, trying to find some relief from the pressure crushing his
skull, the adrenalized blood surging through his system. He needed
to get away from his prodigal mother and the curious stares of the
locals, away from the pain his father must be suffering at seeing
Claire again, but most of all, away from Piper, quietly watching
him while the walls closed in.

“
I can’t deal with you at the
moment. Give me a break, all right?” He raised a hand, his bones
feeling like they’d been hollowed out and filled with lead. “Just
give me a break.”

Without meeting Piper’s eyes again
he spun around and jogged off the field, pretending he wasn’t doing
exactly what he always accused Piper of—running away.

***

Piper stormed up to West’s house,
his mother’s tears fresh in her mind. She’d come to look after
Bill, Claire had told her after West stormed off. And while Piper
understood why West wouldn’t be happy to see his
mother—honestly—shouting at her and stomping off the
pitch?

Assuring Claire she’d talk some
sense into West, or at least, calm him down enough to listen to
reason, she left the field five minutes after his departure. She
hadn’t even stopped to change out of her rugby gear. She paused in
West’s downstairs hallway, toeing off her boots. Well, too bad
about the trail of mud across West’s floor.

She climbed the stairs and pushed
open his bedroom door, the splash and hiss of his en suite shower
the only sound in the stillness. A quick, curious glance around the
masculine pewter and white color-schemed room revealed no
surprises, but the polished walnut piano beside the French doors
tugged a gasp from her chest. Claire’s piano—he still had it. And
from the exposed keyboard and scatter of sheet music on top, it
wasn’t just decoration. He still played. But not since she became
an unwelcome houseguest.

“
Hey,” she shouted. “I wanna talk
to you.”

“
Leave me alone, Piper,” West’s
voice rose above the running water.

He hadn’t told her to “piss off”
or “stop bitching at me and go back to the city.” Progress,
right?

“
Not this time.” Catching West in
the shower meant she’d have a captive audience.

Knowing he wouldn’t have locked
it, Piper walked inside and shut the door behind her. In her
imagined scenario, the steam-filled room would modestly conceal
West in the shower cubicle while she talked.

She hadn’t taken into account an
extractor fan. No steamed-up mirrors, no fogged-up shower glass,
just the whirr of the fan and the hiss of the water. Plus the
tanned and very bare length of West’s body. She froze beside the
door and gripped the doorknob, her heart hurtling into her
throat.

Thank God he faced away from her.
The sight of his toned ass turned her breathing into an asthmatic
wheeze. She debated a quick, quiet exit, but tossed that idea
out—West was on the back foot here, since she had clothes on.
Besides, the tension etched across the muscles of his back
indicated he knew she was already inside.

Just keep it above neck level, say
what you need to say, and get out.

She cleared her throat. “That was
a crappy way to talk to your mother. You made her cry.”

West pulled his head out of the
spray and scrubbed water off his face. “The woman cries at a drop
of a hat. It goes with her artistic temperament.”

Then he turned.

Holy guacamole. Piper nearly
wrenched the doorknob off the door. Her brain must’ve missed the
memo to keep her eyes above West’s neck because, hello—nicely
shaped pecs, washboard flat abs, corded thigh muscles…and then her
gaze skipped straight back up to his, er, expanding
interest.

“
True, buhht…” Her tongue unfurled
to her knees when West rubbed a bar of soap over his chest, never
taking his direct, blue gaze from her.

“
So you barged in here to tell me
I was rude to my mother?” Water sprayed over his shoulder, running
down his body. His soapy hand slid from pecs to the trail of dark
hair low on his belly. A happy, happy trail indeed.

“
Well, I…” She licked dry lips,
looked at anything other than where his hand headed, and found her
mud-flecked, crimson-cheeked reflection instead.

So much for West’s awkwardness at
being butt naked—she was the one exposed and vulnerable. Her
excuses for being there suddenly seemed lame. Under the
circumstances maybe his reaction to Claire was understandable, and
though she told his mother she’d talk to him, nothing was so
important the conversation couldn’t wait until
after
West
had finished being all wet and hot and naked.

The creak of the shower door made
her jump.

“
Piper?” His voice, low and loaded
with seduction, blazed through her.

West left the shower, water
cascading off him and onto the tiled floor. She averted her gaze
and turned her back, yanking on the doorknob again. It slipped
through her damp fingers.

“
Is this really about my mother or
did you barge in here for something else?”

The spicy scent of his shower gel
curled around her and the heat of his skin singed the fine hairs on
the back of her arm, but still she grappled with the stubborn
doorknob.

“
Like because you’re very, very
muddy,” he said.

His breath touched the back of her
neck, droplets of water falling on her shoulder. “There’s a clean
spot here, I think.”

A thumb traced the sensitive skin
behind one ear and her vision blurred.

“
And another here.” Warm lips
trailed along the curve where the cords of her neck met her
shoulder.

“
But on the whole—” his hand
snaked around her waist, fingers spread wide across her lower
belly.

Hot shivers arrowed through her
pelvis and struck their target.

“—
You’re a dirty girl who should
hit the shower—” he pressed her hips back against his body,
shifting so his erection wedged intimately between her
Lyrca-covered cheeks “—with me.”

West untangled her fingers from
the doorknob and lacing them with his own, drew them behind her
body to rest on his thigh. His lips closed over an earlobe, teeth
gently grazing the small fleshy edge. A protest turned into a moan
when his fingers moved from her belly to gently roll a nipple
through the fabric of her top. Her hips jerked back in reflex and
this time it was him who moaned, his breath a harsh pant in her
ear. His body shifted to one side and he wrapped her palm around a
part of his anatomy, which grew larger in her hand as her grip
tightened.

“
God.” He slid his fingers out
from hers, but she couldn’t seem to let go.

She should peel her hand from his
slick, satiny skin and not continue to stroke her thumb up and
down. Take her hand off his body and get the hell out of this
situation. Yet her weak limbs refused to fight as his breathing,
ragged and harsh, puffed against her nape.

“
Piper…I need you.”

Those four words transfixed her
because in this moment, when things hurtled out of control for them
both, he needed her to be his anchor.

And she needed him.

“
Shower. Now.” She gasped when his
hand slid under her tee shirt.

West scooped her off her feet and
transplanted her there before she could change her mind.

The pink tee shirt splattered on
the floor outside the shower, closely followed by her Lycra shorts,
and black sports bra, leaving her in only a tiny black thong. West
backed her into the shower corner and kneeled before her, drawing
the scrap of fabric down her legs and stopping to kiss a pair of
freckles just below her pubic bone. His gaze when it returned to
hers was hot and intimate, but this couldn’t be anything other than
the two of them taking the physical release they needed.

“
You played rugby in a thong?” The
stubble on his chin rasped along her inner thigh, his breath
teasing the sensitive flesh hidden by soft curls. Her knees went
gelatinous, and leaning against the glass cubicle she prayed they’d
hold her weight.

“
No panty line.”

“
Mmm. I noticed.” His forefinger
and thumb ran down the “v” of her sex, gently spreading the folds
apart.

Her hands clutched at West’s
shoulders and she swore it was the lack of oxygen in such a small
space that gave her voice a sex-kitten breathiness. “You’re such a
pervert.”

“
Baby, you’ve no idea.” He rubbed
a knuckle against her inner lips, carefully avoiding the swollen
bundle of nerves, which cried out for his attention.

Hips thrusting forward, a moan
escaped from deep inside. “Please.”

He stroked the very tip of his
tongue to her core and at the same instant slid two fingers inside
her. Little stars flashed behind her closed lids. If he got her any
hotter she’d melt into a pool of goo and be lost down the
drain.

“
Feels good, huh?” He pulled back
slightly to support her butt with one hand as she sagged against
the shower wall.

“
Feels okay.” She transferred her
grip from his shoulder to his dripping hair. “But maybe I should
clean up. I’m still covered in mud.” And because if he didn’t
remove those slowly thrusting fingers, she would come in the next
two minutes.

West’s low rumble of amusement
sent flickers of molten heat into her womb. He leaned in to nip her
thigh.

“
Trust me, Pipe, this bit isn’t.”
And he buried his face between her legs, making a liar out of her
in less than half her estimated time.

***

Piper tasted of musk and the
sweetest, earthiest honey. Her juices on West’s lips addled his
brain and throbbed all the way down to his straining cock, which
begged for the opportunity to swap places with his tongue. Her
little mews of pleasure vied for dominance over the hiss of falling
water. He’d waited half a lifetime to taste her and even though her
hand fisted in his hair hard enough to leave a bald patch, nothing
would pull his mouth away.