Jaded (21 page)

She outlined a three-phase approach to implementing her suggestions and a cost/benefit analysis that had kept her up nights, and ended with another slide of Cody’s mural. “I think,” she said, then paused. This wasn’t part of the presentation. “I think you have something wonderful here. In an age of increasing disconnectedness, you have the resources and means to connect with the world beyond Chatham County, but more importantly, with each other. Thank you.”

She didn’t expect applause as she turned off her microphone, but it came anyway, too enthusiastic to be merely polite. To her surprise, people wanted to talk to her afterwards, make suggestions, offer opinions, thank her for her work. In the front row, Mrs. Battle fielded questions as well. Mayor Turner climbed the steps to the stage.

“Nicely done,” he said in a low voice.

“I’m a little surprised to hear you say it.”

He gave her a surprisingly impish grin. “This is a contrary bunch. Sometimes I have to be against something to build popular support for it. We do better if we think we’ve come up with the idea, not had our mayor cram it down our throats.”

“Well, it’s a beautiful building, and such an important part of the community.”

“I’ll get back to you about the proposal,” he said. “The council will meet and vote soon. Thank you for all your hard work.”

A generic brush-off she’d heard a hundred times before. “I’ll look forward to hearing from you,” she said.

She closed down her laptop and disconnected it from the projector. Lucas still stood by the parking lot exit. “Can I get a ride back to the library?” she asked. “I drove Mrs. Battle home in her car. If you’re busy, I can walk.”

“I’ll drive you,” he said. “When are you leaving?”

She blew out her breath. “Day after tomorrow, probably. It’s a nine-hour drive.”

He held the door open for her. “You’re not packed yet.”

“It won’t take long,” she said. “I learned to travel light before I was ten. It got much easier when I got an e-reader. I always packed more books than clothes, to my mother’s total despair.”

“Nice job with the presentation,” he said. “You made a library sound both necessary and really exciting.”

“Libraries
are
both necessary and really exciting,” she said. “To me anyway.”

He parked in the lot and killed the lights. “This wouldn’t have worked, would it?”

“It was temporary,” she said. “We both knew that. Besides, we’re practically a cliché. Introverted research librarian and a chief of police.”

A small breath of laughter huffed from his nostrils as he looked at her. “A cliché,” he said.

“You know. Repressed. Sexually adventurous.”

“You came on to me,” he said with a knowing smile. “Not repressed. Also not really a librarian. Maybe we’re not a cliché.”

The air in the car should have cooled without the heater running, but little sparking shocks of electric heat crackled between them. “Want to come inside and find out?”

In answer, he opened his door. She left her laptop bag on the floorboard but brought her purse, then went on to unlock the front door with all the casualness she could muster. He stood close enough for her to feel the heat radiating from his body, but not improperly close, and that distance made her heart pound.

Once inside, she snagged a stack of encyclopedias waiting to be reshelved, then led him to the staircase spiraling up to the reference section and unhooked the dusty velvet rope holding the brass
Staff Only
sign. He followed her up the tight spiral, then into the darkest corner of the building.

“Very librarian,” he said, looking around, but his voice had dropped a register.

“Very practical,” she replied. “My office windows overlook the parking lot, and the rooms in the basement lack ambiance.”

She turned her back on him and set the books on a low shelf and turned on one of the desk lamps illuminating a section of shelving. Without turning around, she turned the books spine out and examined the labels. Behind her Lucas stood quietly. She thought about her skirt and cashmere cardigan over a silk blouse. She even wore a strand of pearls and her brown suede heels. Moving very slowly, she selected the first two books from the stack and turned to shelve them.

Lucas was right behind her. She hadn’t heard him move, not a rustle of denim over the beating of her heart. He leaned his body weight against hers and swept aside her chin-length hair. It slithered back, obscuring the kiss he pressed into the skin between her collar and hairline.

“Damn,” he growled.

She gave a hiccupping little laugh that cut off abruptly when he repeated the motion. This time he gathered the strands into his fist, then used the pressure to tip her head forward.

Oh. Oh oh oh. The pressure of his knuckles against her skull was an erotic contrast to the teasing, testing brush of his lips against her nape. Hard against hard, soft against soft, the primitive possession of his fist in her hair. His mouth worked over the sensitive patch on her nape, first hot and gentle, then with a scrape of his teeth.

Her hands trembled as she slid one book, then the second, into their proper places, and if she took a minute to double-, then triple-check to be sure they were correctly shelved, well, she was a conscientious librarian.

Lucas turned his head and set his teeth into her nape. She gripped the shelf until her knuckles turned white while sparks skittered along her nerves. Her jaw slackened and a very faint moan sounded in her throat.

“I should . . .” she said weakly.

“You definitely should,” he replied.

The laugh edging its way up her throat belonged to another woman. “There are more books to put away. . . .”

With one last hot kiss to her nape he stepped away enough for her to pick up the smaller stack, double-check the spines, then walk to the next row. Lucas leaned against the end of the shelf, watching her.

This time he touched her first, reaching out to trail his fingertips down the length of her arm. “Soft,” he said quietly.

She hummed her agreement, then tucked her hair behind her ear.

He stroked the collar of her silk blouse with the back of his index finger. “Warm and soft.”

The nerves in her throat tingled a proximity warning. When she nodded, her hair slid free from her ear, against her cheek. She slid the last book into place, then startled when his index finger rose to push the hair back from her cheek.

“Hot and soft,” he said as he tucked the strands behind her ear again.

Heat flared stronger in her face. “I can’t help it around you,” she confessed.

“I can’t tell you how hot that makes me,” he said.

His finger followed the curve of her jaw to her chin, then tipped her face up to his. For a long moment, his mouth hovered over hers, parted lips to parted lips, nothing more than breath shared before he increased the pressure. The noise she made when his tongue slipped between her lips to slide against hers was positively decadent.

When they broke apart, she was gripping the edges of his shirt in her fists. Without breaking eye contact, he brushed his fingertips against her collarbone, then set his fingers to the buttons of both shirt and sweater.

“Pearls,” he said, eyeing her necklace nestled at the base of her throat.

“Cliché,” she replied.

A low, rough laugh that cut off abruptly when he saw her lacy bra.

“Skin oil is good for them,” she said as he kissed and licked his way down her throat. “I wear them often. They were—oh—my grandmother’s . . . oh.”

He wrapped his arm around her hips and bumped her back against the shelves.

“No!” she gasped. “They’re not secured—!”

He grabbed the long shelf just in time to keep it from thudding over, setting off the shelves like a short row of dominos. The head-high shelf swayed alarmingly, and Alana scurried to grab the far end.

When the danger passed, her gaze met Lucas’s. Slightly hysterical laughter burbled in her throat, but he strode down the short aisle in two strides and backed her into the plaster wall with two more. Sandwiched between the wall and his hard-planed chest, she felt the breath leave her in a huff. He gave it back with a kiss he ended only to crouch and run his hand up her leg, gathering her skirt as he went. She wriggled to help him get it up around her hips, even as she unbuttoned his shirt; her panties slid to the floor.

The heel of his hand pressed to her mound and she whimpered when his fingers slid into her folds. His tongue mirrored his fingers as he stroked and circled. Her hands inside his dress shirt, she gripped his sides and held on.

Up against a wall. She was about to have sex up against the library’s wall, and all she could think about was
more now please
.

One fingertip dipped inside and drew slick heat up to her clit. She made a high-pitched stuttering noise and dropped her head forward to rest against his shoulder. When she trembled on the edge, he withdrew his hand and stepped back to get a condom from his wallet and smooth it on.

Her heels brought them to almost the right height. He widened his stance and urged his hips forward, seeking the right alignment. Finding it meant he glided into her without any preparatory strokes. She gasped and fisted her hands in his shirt.

“Okay?”

She nodded jerkily. She’d never get used to this, the shocking, stretching glide of him inside her, not even if she had all the time in the world. For a brief moment, her manners ruled; she tried to think of ways to help him hold her upright, but then he leaned his chest into hers, secured her hips with one arm, braced the other by her head, and started to move.

Then she stopped thinking at all. It was hot and fast and relentless, not deep but each stroke worked the sensitive flesh at her entrance. Her head dropped back, thunking against the wall, then turning to the side as pleasure coursed like lava through her veins. Her muscles tightened, inside and out, drawing a low groan from him. The rough rumble eddied against her skin, tightening her nipples and sending a shock wave into her pelvis.

The universe contracted, held for a beat, then flung her out into blackness. She curled into him, seeking the heat and strength and stability of his broad shoulders as the shudders wracked her. With a low groan, Lucas stroked deep and surrendered to his own release.

“Oh, God,” she said.

Something in her bewildered tone struck Lucas as funny because he laughed. “Yeah.” Tipping her unresisting head on her neck, he nuzzled into her cheekbone, then ear. “Still feel like a cliché?”

“No,” she said. She felt like she was home. Like this was so right, so good, so her, that it meant something.

Her heartbeat had slowed to something resembling normal when Lucas stepped away and dealt with the condom. Making herself decent again made her blush twice as hard. Panties up, skirt down, blouse buttoned, sweater buttoned over her blouse. Lucas gave her a crooked little smile, then said, “Let me . . .”

She laughed and pushed her hair out of her face while he rebuttoned both blouse and sweater. “There.”

“Do I look presentable?”

“You look like you belong here.”

She gaped at him.

“Sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking. You look like you just had illicit, very hot sex,” he said matter-of-factly.

“Oh my God.”

“It’s dark and we’re going home.” He held out his hand, support she appreciated when the danger of navigating a tight spiral staircase in heels with the aftershocks of sex weakening her knees became clear.

Outside, she locked up again, Lucas waiting patiently on the sidewalk leading to the parking lot. He scanned the street, then checked his phone. Subconsciously triggered, she checked her own iPhone for incoming messages as she walked to her car. Two from Freddie, one from her mother, and one from Marissa.

Hi, Alana! Adam proposed last night and I said yes. Neither of us want a big wedding, so we’re making plans for this weekend. One of the local wedding package places had a last-minute cancellation. Most of Adam’s friends are still stationed here in San Diego. His lieutenant is flying in from Chicago and offered to stop and pick up Adam’s mom and anyone else coming from Walkers Ford (Lucas????? Adam invited him!). Will you come? Please say you will. I know your contract is up and your family wants you home, but please take a few more days off and come to San Diego for the wedding.

We wouldn’t be having it without you. Please come.

Love, Marissa

She wasn’t ready for this to end. “Marissa and Adam are getting married this weekend in San Diego. I’m invited.”

“Me, too,” he said absently. “It’s short notice. I don’t know that I can get someone to cover for me. You going to go?”

She looked at him and made yet another impulsive decision. “Yes.”

He lifted one eyebrow. “I thought you were due home.”

She looked at him over the Blazer’s hood, weighing the consequences of postponing her return for a few more days. With the presentation delivered, there was no reason for her not to pack her car and leave as planned, giving her the weekend to unpack. If she went to San Diego, she’d jump right back into foundation work, not to mention wedding planning. Freddie wouldn’t like it.

But this was a once-in-a-lifetime event for Adam and Marissa.

Her mother wouldn’t like it, either.

Too bad.

“I am,” she said. “They’ll just have to get along without me for another few days. Come with me. It’ll be fun.”

He turned to look over his shoulder, and she was sure he would say no, that he was needed here, that their understanding was that this was over and they should keep it that way.

She gripped her iPhone too tightly to pretend this was casual, but couldn’t make her fingers relax.
Definitely entangled
, she thought.
And the knots are getting tighter and tighter.

“You know, I haven’t taken a vacation since I was hired,” he said conversationally.

His gaze met hers, and she breathed again. “Okay. Good. I’m glad. I’m really . . . I’ll coordinate with Marissa.”

“Great.”