Love Me (12 page)

And then she was saying, “Oh my God, I'm going to come again,” in a low, raw voice.

He could hardly believe it, that without anything more than not quite half of his cock inside her, her muscles were tightening down on him, squeezing his sensitive cock head for everything it was worth. Whatever shreds of control he had left were immediately lost as he pul ed her mouth down to his and ravaged her with his lips and teeth and tongue. In the next breath his cock was in to the hilt and he was right there with her as she cried out into his mouth, his groans of pleasure indistinguishable from hers.

The next day they went for a long walk on the beach and Janica fil ed up his pockets with seashel s, exclaiming that each one was “the most beautiful one she'd ever seen.” They bought some clams and mussels out on the pier and had the messiest lunch in memory feeding each other buttery mol usks, which only got messier when Janica stopped eating and instead squirted them at him, shooting them out of their shel s like little slippery missiles. His immediate thoughts about the huge mess they were making and what a pain in the ass it was going to be to clean up were quickly overridden by the need to nail her with his own uneaten clams.

They'd ended up ful y dressed in the shower, cleaning each other careful y, first with a bar of soap and their hands, and then their mouths, and then he took her up against the tile wal again. It had been a combination of playful and hot and hungry too that he'd never known existed.

Night fel and they made burgers on the gril , also polishing off a bag of potato chips. Luke could have easily written a textbook on proper nutrition, but it was the strangest thing that instead of having less energy after easing up on the “good” stuff, he had more. But it wasn't the food, he knew.

It was Janica.

As his mid-30s had crept up on him he'd been more and more careful about diet and exercise. But with her he felt at least a decade younger. Stil , when she reached into the grocery bags after dinner and pul ed out a huge bag of marshmal ows and chocolate and graham crackers, he decided that next time he should pay closer attention to what they bought at the store. Of course, that would mean he'd somehow have to learn how to stop focusing on her ass as she walked down the aisles.

Which meant that it was far more likely he'd have to get used to eating crap food. Because her ass was a goddamned miracle.

It wasn't until he was almost past his thoughts, that he realized where he was going with them.
When had
grocery shopping with Janica in the future become
something that was a given beyond the next few
days?

He knew better, knew he'd been horribly remiss about stopping things between them from going any further. Where Janica was concerned, right now he just didn't have it in him to be the strong one. To be the voice of reason. To do the right thing, no matter the personal cost.

He looked up just as she threw the bag of

marshmal ows at him, and then the chocolate. He caught them right before they nailed him in the forehead.

After grabbing a box of graham crackers, she headed for the door. “How are your fire-making skil s?”

He nailed her with a hard look that told her she didn't know who she was messing with. “I was the top scout in my troop.”

“Of course you were,” she teased. “I don't know why I even bothered to ask. Some things are just a given, aren't they?”

“Hey,” he said as he caught up to her and grabbed her around the waist, “don't knock the outdoor skil s, babe. Hands down, there's no one you would rather be lost in the woods with.”

She reached her hand up to his cheek. “Even without the mad scouting skil s, there's no one I would rather be with. In the woods or otherwise.” And then she pul ed out of his hold and scampered down the stairs. His head, his heart, reeled as he fol owed after her. She'd held up her end of the “just fun” bargain real y wel so far. Almost too wel . So far, that had been her only slip.

But knowing how much she enjoyed being with him wasn't what had him reeling. After al , he already knew she loved him.

No, what gave him pause was how much he liked hearing her say it.

How much he liked knowing it.

Too damn much.

She was already col ecting rocks and arranging them in a circle on the sand by the time he reached her with an armful of sticks and broken logs that he'd found in the woods between the cabin and the beach. It was a stil night out on the coast, and he easily lit a match and put it to the kindling. Minutes later, a bonfire was roaring.

It was the most natural thing in the world to sit down on a blanket in front of the fire with Janica between his legs, her back pressed to his stomach, his arms around her, holding her tight. They stared into the flames in silence for quite a while, her head leaning back against his chest, his chin resting lightly on the top of her dark head.

But despite what should have been the perfect peace of being out on the beach under the stars, Luke felt as if his insides were shifting around, conflicting emotions pushing at each other inside his chest.

He wanted to know more about this beautiful woman he was holding. He already knew just how she like to be kissed, stroked. He knew what made her cry out with pleasure, exactly how to take her to the peak and over.

It wasn't enough, damn it.

“Did you always know you wanted to design clothes?”

He felt the slightest tightening of her body against his before she replied. “Pretty much. Lily used to take me to the store and buy whatever dol s were on sale.”

“What kind of dol goes on sale?”

He loved feeling her laughter rumble through her chest to his. “The real y ugly ones. But they weren't ugly for long, because we'd head to the fabric store next and rifle through their scrap bins. You could fil a bag for five dol ars. I'd spend hours cutting and sewing at home.”

“Why do I have a feeling you weren't making your dol s pretty little dresses?”

He felt the light jab of her elbow against his ribs. “Are you accusing me of making them look like little Goth sluts?”

He brushed the hair away from the side of her neck and pressed a kiss there by way of an apology. “No. But you definitely don't look at things the way everyone else does.”

Her skin was so soft, so sweet smel ing, one kiss wasn't enough.

He wanted more.

And not just more of her incredible body. He wanted more of her. More information about what made her tick. More stories about how she'd grown from a little girl into this incredible woman.

“Was it hard to start a business?”

She shifted again in obvious surprise at his question and her hair shifted back to cover her neck. “I thought we weren't asking questions?”

She was right. He'd asked for fun. And nothing but. If he were being smart, he'd simply strip her clothes off and make love to her, no more words, no more getting inside her head. Her heart.

But it wasn't enough.

“I want to know more about you.”

The silence stretched out between them, the crackling of the fire and the waves washing up on the shore not nearly big enough to fil it.

Final y, she softly said, “I was a little scared.”

It took him a long moment to realize she was answering his earlier question, rather than commenting on his wanting to know her. Because she had to know, just as he did, that it was a real y bad idea to talk like this, to get in even deeper with each other.

“But even though I was scared,” she continued, “I knew I would regret it forever if I didn't go for what I wanted.”

He wasn't ready for the way her words settled themselves way down deep in his gut and was glad when she didn't let them linger.

“I have Lily to thank for so much of my success. I can't even calculate how many hours she sat there on the floor and clapped and cheered while my dol s gave imaginary fashion shows. And she was such a sensation in my final show for school, and then my first show on my own.”

“I love Lily too,” he said, “but I'm not asking about her. I'm asking about you.”

“Wel , here's something you should know about me.”

She moved out of his arms and reached for a stick and the bag of marshmal ows. “I have a major sweet tooth.”

He shouldn't be feeling disappointed at her clear switch away from his probing. He should be thanking her for keeping them in safe territory.

Fuck. Who was he kidding? They hadn't been anywhere near safe territory since the moment he rang her doorbel and kissed her.

She handed him a long stick and a couple of marshmal ows and side by side they held them over the flames. A minute later they were assembling their s'mores. The sound she made when the sugar and chocolate hit her tongue was almost enough to make him jealous.

“That good, huh?”

She opened her eyes back up and smiled at him. “Only one thing is better.”

She pressed her lips against his and he tasted the lingering sweetness on her tongue.

“What about you?” she whispered against his lips. What was it about kissing her that made him lose hold of his brain, he wondered as he repeated, “Me?”

“Do you like it?”

“I love kissing you.”

She pressed her lips back to his, harder this time. When she pul ed away, she said, “Good. But I was talking about your dessert.”

He looked at the s'more in his hand as if it was the first time he'd seen it.

“Take a bite,” she insisted.

Food had never been al that important to him before, simply something he took care of to keep his energy up. And it had certainly never been sensual. Until now.

Her eyes never left his mouth as he bit into the gooey treat. He felt crumbs on his lips but he didn't have time to brush them away, because Janica's tongue made it there first.

He barely managed to swal ow as she sat back, waiting expectantly for his answer.

“So?”

“It's good. But I stil like the taste of your kisses better.”

Her smile was as bright as the bonfire. “You know, with lines like that you could have given your brother a run for his money.”

Knowing she and Travis had always had a fairly bumpy relationship, he said, “He's a good guy. Better than most people know.”

She looked uncharacteristical y serious. “I see the way he treats Lily. I know how good he is. But that doesn't change his past.”

Something about her statement, something about the words, But that doesn't change his past, sent a warning bel clanging through his head. He ignored it, though, because he was far more concerned with wanting to see another smile on her face than any more warning signs. Lord knew, there'd been a bucket ful of them thrown at him since their first kiss. And he'd ignored them al .

“You may find this hard to believe,” he told her, “but when we were kids, I was the daredevil.”

She cocked her head, looked at him. “I'm not that surprised, actual y. You do have a sort of latent wild look about you,” she teased.

“If you're not careful I'm going to shove the rest of that s'more into your mouth just to keep you quiet.”

“I can think of something else you could shove into my mouth to keep me quiet,” she offered wickedly.

“Don't tempt me,” he growled, pul ing her back against his chest. And, of course, he wanted to feel her taking his cock into her mouth. Who wouldn't?

The thing was, right now he wanted to talk to her even more.

You're asking for trouble
, a voice in the back of his head that had joined the warning bel cautioned him, but then she was saying, “Tel me more about al the trouble you got Travis in.”

“I learned to swim before he did, which he hated because he always liked to think of himself as the older brother. Those sixty seconds before I came out are real y important to him, you know.”

“Figures,” she said.

Laughing, he said, “Anyway, one afternoon when he was being a real piece of work, we were out by the pool and I dared him to jump into the deep end.”

“The idiot jumped, didn't he?”

Luke laughed too, remembering. “Of course he did. But in the end, it al worked out just fine for him.”

“Why? Because you saved him?”

“Yeah, I saved him. But it was our busty young babysitter who made his day. I swear he sat there with his head between her breasts the rest of the afternoon.

”

“How old were you?”

“Six. Seven, maybe.”

Janica giggled. “Come on. He was just a kid. He couldn't have already been such a dog. Now you're just talking smack about him because you know I like to hear it.” And then she said, “But I'l admit, it was pretty weird when he started dating my sister. I guess I always thought that she'd end up with you.”

“No chance,” he said. “Lily and I were only friends.”

“But you spent so much time together. How could nothing have happened? Something had to have happened at some point.”

Fuck. This was awkward.

“We kissed once,” he admitted.

“Aha! I knew it.”

“We had zero chemistry, Janica.”

“How could someone have zero chemistry with you?”

He had to kiss her. “I'm flattered.”

“Flattery has nothing to do with it, Luke.” She ran the pad of her thumb across his lips. “You're the best kisser I've ever known.”

He leaned in to capture her sugary lips and it was the sweetest kiss they'd ever shared.

“I love you,” she whispered against his lips. The three words ricocheted through him just as they always did. And each time something inside of him shifted a little bit more.

Al owing himself one more sensuous sweep of his tongue against hers, he pul ed back. “Janica, I—”

Her eyes were dilated, her cheeks so flushed with arousal that he could see the heightened color on her face even in the dim firelight.

“Shut up and kiss me some more, Luke.”

Every time she gave him an out.

And every time he deserved it less.

But the worst part of it was that he knew he was going to take it anyway.

His mouth never leaving hers, he laid her back on the blanket. He wanted to look at her, this beautiful miracle in his arms. Shifting so that he could run his hands over her shoulders, slowly down her arms, he drank in the sight of her.