One in a Million (16 page)

“I told you it would be okay,” she whispered in his ear.

“I’m probably grounded for life,” he whispered back.

“Not life,” Tanner, said and cupped the nape of Troy’s neck, giving him an affectionate but none-too-gentle shove toward the way they’d come. “Just your foreseeable future. But hey, look on the bright side, you’ve got a dark purple room to sit in.”

Troy sighed.

Tanner pointed to his truck and Troy got in.

Tanner walked past the vehicle and opened Callie’s driver-side door for her, waiting until she sat before crouching down and looking into her face.

“Are you mad?” she asked worriedly.

He ran a finger along her temple. “My son got into trouble and he called you for help. I’m not mad. I’m fucking grateful. Now I have to go have a very long, very detailed discussion with my knuckle-headed son.”

“You can’t get mad at him,” she said. “I promised him that you wouldn’t.”

“Not a smart promise, babe.”

“Tanner, I’m serious.”

“Me too,” he said. “He screwed up. There’s got to be consequences for that.”

“You can’t,” she said. “You said you weren’t mad.”

“At you. I’m not mad at you.”

“Tanner—”

“Callie, he’s getting a D in English and he was supposed to be working on a research paper to help his grade. Instead he sneaked out of the house,” he said with calm steel. “He put himself and nearly a teenage girl at risk. I have to deal with that.”

“And in doing so, you’re making me go back on my word.”

“You shouldn’t have promised him anything that had to do with him and me.”

She heard him, heard the logic and accepted that he was right, but it didn’t make it any easier for her to take. Nor did the fact that she had no idea why she was so fired up about this. Maybe because she could still see the fear on Troy’s face, and how desperately he’d wanted to keep this screwup from his father. “He kept it from you not because he didn’t want to get in trouble,” she said, “but because he was afraid you’d send him away.”

“I’ll never send him away,” Tanner said with such utter conviction that it brought tears to Callie’s eyes. Great, and now she was envious of a father/son relationship. “Please move,” she said, and when he did, she shut her door and drove off.

Callie was awoken yet again, this time to a knock at her door.

Becca, she thought. For breakfast. Damn, she’d overslept. No wonder, since it’d taken her hours to fall asleep after she’d gotten home.

At the thought of what had happened the night before, she sighed. She’d overstepped a line and tried to tell Tanner how to parent. She, who had no idea how.

What had she been thinking?

And even then, Tanner had followed her home to make sure she’d gotten there okay. Well, that or he was making sure she wasn’t going to his house to yell at him some more. In either case, she’d seen him pull into the warehouse lot and wait until she’d let herself in.

A good guy to the end.

And it was the end. She’d let herself get in too deep. It was time to swim for shore and call it a day.

The knock came again.

She cracked a lid open. Muted, gray daylight poured in the windows. Rain slashed against the glass, drumming against the roof noisily.

A storm had rolled in.

And there went the third knock. “Coming!” she called out, and rubbed her eyes as she ran to the door. “I’m sorry,” she said as she pulled it open, shivering at the chill that hit her. “I’m going to need a few minutes to—”

But she broke off because it wasn’t Becca.

Nope.

Not even close.

It was the last person on earth she’d expected to see.

Okay, maybe not the last person. That honor certainly would’ve gone to Perfect Eric and his Perfect Wife with her freakishly straight white teeth…

Instead, it was Tanner, clearly having just come in from the rain, his clothes plastered to him, looking hotter and more awake than any man should look, holding—oh God, how was she supposed to resist this—coffees and a bag that smelled even more delicious than he did.

T
anner had done a lot of crazy shit in his lifetime, often taking his life in his hands while he was at it: playing football without a healthy respect for the danger of the sport, going into the navy and then into Special Forces from there—talk about a not-guaranteed happy ending. And it hadn’t gotten any better on the rigs.

So yeah, he’d say he was pretty good at danger, at adrenaline rushes, at living in the moment—knowing the next moment might never come.

What he wasn’t so good at was doubt. He’d long ago learned to squelch that emotion deep and ignore it, pretending it didn’t exist.

And yet a lifetime of lessons of doing just that flew out of the window as he stood there drenched from the pounding rain in Callie’s doorway, never having felt less sure of himself.

He couldn’t even bank on her opening the door.

But then she did. Hair wild, not a lick of makeup, wearing…well, he wasn’t sure what that was. Either really, really big sweats or a potato sack.

And it didn’t matter.

She looked beautiful.

Her first expression was a flash of things. Relief. Happiness. A welcome heat.

But all that was quickly buried behind an expression of calm indifference.

He didn’t even try to reason with her. He stepped into her, forcing her back a step if she wanted to avoid a collision.

Which clearly she did. Whether it was because he was wetter than the ocean or because she was still mad at him remained to be seen.

He took the liberty of shutting and bolting the door and handed her a coffee.

“Tanner—”

“Drink,” he said firmly.

He waited until she’d taken a few sips, until her eyes cleared and focused, and then he braced for the real battle. “About last night,” he said.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” she said stiffly.

“Tough shit.”

She set down her coffee and went hands on hips. “Excuse me?”

“You heard me.” He took her hand and led her to the couch, deciding that her passiveness was more due to the fact that she’d not yet fully absorbed the caffeine than actual submissiveness.

He gave her a gentle shove, and she plopped backward onto the cushions and sputtered.

Before she could bounce up again, he sat at her side and faced her, planting a hand on the couch at either side of her hips.

Caging her in.

“You’re all wet and cold,” she complained.

“If that was what was bothering you, you’d not have let me in,” he said.

“I didn’t let you in, you just helped yourself.”

“You could’ve stopped me.”

She lifted a shoulder and turned her head away. “I don’t care for the caveman treatment.”

“And I don’t care for being shut out.”

“Shut out?” She shoved at his shoulders, but instead of moving, he caught her hands in his. “You can’t be shut out when you’re not in,” she said.

“Oh, I’m in,” he said, shifting closer so that he still wasn’t touching her, wasn’t getting her wet, but there was scarcely a breath separating them either. “I’m in and that’s the problem, isn’t it? You’re not happy about that.”

She didn’t have a response. At least not one she was willing to share.

“You said we were friends with benefits,” he reminded her.

“You’re getting my couch wet. And I said we were friends with benefits without the friends part.”

“You’re wrong,” he said. “We’ve become friends in spite of ourselves.”

“We…” She frowned as she gave that some thought.

“You saved me a seat at the bakery,” he said. “That was a
friendly
thing to do.”

“I was saving the seat for you so that I wouldn’t have to be
friendly
to anyone else,” she said.

“And I brought you coffee here so you wouldn’t have to go back after you had your meltdown over Dickhead,” he said. “Also a friendly gesture.”

“Hey,” she said. “I didn’t have a meltdown.”

He went brows up.

“Okay, it was a little bit of a meltdown.” She covered her face.

He pulled her hands from her face. “You’re there for Troy,” he said. “Like last night. And more than anything, I love that.”

“That’s not for you,” she said stiffly, still pissy. “That’s for me. And him.”

“It means a lot to him,” he said. “And me.”

Her gaze flew up to his and held, and then softened. “I’d do just about anything for him.”

Her eyes said she’d do anything for Tanner as well.

“He reminds me of you,” she murmured.

Grateful to see her warming up to him, he smiled. “Answer this,” he said quietly. “Why are you really here?”

“Because I live here. And the only reason you’re here is because you woke me up and made me let you in.”

“Smartass,” he said. “In Lucky Harbor.”

“You know why. For my grandma. I came to make sure she wasn’t losing it. She means a lot to me.”

“I get that,” he said. “But at least admit that it’s not all about her. Because we both know Lucille’s not losing it. She’s saner than the rest of us. She is, however, bored and nosy as hell. Separate issues. So other than the guise of making sure she’s okay, why are you here?”

“The guise of making sure my grandma’s okay?” she repeated. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You tell me,” he said.

She stared at him. “You think I’m here for something else. Maybe to figure my shit out. But I’ve got my shit figured out.”

“Then why haven’t you been in a real relationship in the years since you were engaged?” he asked.

“Besides the fact that my job’s made me more than a little cynical? Hello, ditched at the altar,” she reminded him.

“So?”

She snorted. “Spoken by a man who’s never been left at the altar.”

“I was left by my wife,” he said dryly. “I think that counts.”

“But Elisa didn’t publicly embarrass you. I was
ditched at the altar
. Which makes me look pretty stupid. It means I can’t discern the difference between a bad-idea crush and being in love.”

He stared into her eyes. She actually believed that, as well as that she wasn’t meant for love. Which was bullshit. He’d never met anyone more meant for love—to both receive it and give it. “Callie, everyone’s allowed mistakes in the love game.”

She turned away. “Yeah, but I didn’t learn from mine.”

His hands settled on her shoulders and slid down to hold her hands. “What was that?”

“Nothing.”

He turned her to face him. “You said you didn’t learn from yours,” he said.

She blew out an exasperated sigh. “If you heard me, then why did you want me to repeat it?”

“Explain,” he said, not giving an inch.

“I fall in crush,” she said. “Not love. And then I try to make the crush something it’s not.”

“Eric not loving you back the way you deserved, that’s on him,” he said. “Not you.”

“It doesn’t matter,” she said. “I’m sticking with low-key relationships.”

“So you’ll at least concede that what we’re doing here
is
a relationship,” he said.

She stared at him. “Maybe. But it’s not love, and it’s not going to be.”

He stared back, not sure how to argue that one.

“Is it enough for you?” she asked softly.

No. Hell, no. But because that made him feel like he’d just been hit by an M-60, he didn’t answer. Instead he pulled her close and did what they seemed to do best. He kissed her. He kissed her long and deep, doing his best to silence that little voice in his head that kept saying the right thing to do here was walk away…

But for the first time in his life he didn’t know if he could do the right thing, not even to save himself.

Callie couldn’t get enough of Tanner’s mouth or his hands and especially couldn’t get enough of his low groan of frustration just before he wrenched her sweatshirt over her head, taking her PJ top with it. Her bottoms went next, PJs, sweats, and panties all yanked down her legs in one hard tug. When she was bare-ass naked, he leaned over her and smiled a very naughty, very determined smile. Then his teeth closed over her nipple and a hand slid between her legs, and she gasped.

“Cold!” she said of his chilled fingers as they shifted, stroking the bare skin of her back now, sliding down to cup and squeeze her bottom, pulling her in against his wet self.

She sucked in a breath but couldn’t deny she was thrillingly aroused. Being naked against his fully clothed, unyielding body was incredibly erotic, and she clung to him as if he were her next breath of air, winding her fingers through his hair, forgetting about everything but this.

“Shower,” he said against her mouth. “I’ve made you cold, let’s go warm you up.”

Before she could say a word he stood, taking her with him. In the bathroom, he let her slide slowly down his body, eyes hot as he once again took charge, starting the shower, kicking off his shoes.

When he caught her staring, his eyes darkened even more and he yanked her into him while they waited for the water to heat. “What?” he murmured.

“I just like to look at you.”

“Right back at you, babe.”

She smiled, continuing to gaze up at him, memorizing each line on his face because this was going to be it. She knew that she couldn’t keep doing this and not lose her heart. God, she loved the way he looked at her, his gaze so fierce and intense, like she was the only woman for him. She loved the way his mouth twitched when he wanted to smile but was trying not to. And she especially loved the way his voice got all low and husky whenever he said her name.

She didn’t need to feel his body against her, hard, strong, rippling with power, to remember how much she loved it.

Or how she felt in his arms. Feminine. Desired.

Important…

The steam from the shower filled the bathroom and she moved to unzip his Lucky Harbor Charters wind jacket. Before she could push it off his shoulders, he reached into the pocket, pulled out two condoms, and tossed them onto the bathroom counter.

Then his jacket hit the floor. She peeled his wet running shirt upward, her fingers tracing his abs, his pecs, every inch that she revealed until she couldn’t reach any farther and he took over, tossing the shirt aside.

His pants were the next thing to go as he stripped in quick, economical movements, exposing his mouth-watering body to her in all its glory.

And there was a lot of glory.

He tipped her head up and then his mouth came down over hers, his tongue flicking out, tracing her bottom lip, seeking entrance and getting it when she gasped in pleasure.

His hands slid down her back and over the cheeks of her ass, lifting her off the ground and firmly into him. “Still cold?” he asked.

No. She was burning up. She could feel every single inch of his very hot body. He was hard and thick against her, straining between them ready for action, and she was just as ready. Hell, she’d been ready since the moment he’d walked through her door. “Not cold,” she said, and his lips curved against hers.

“What are you then?” he asked.

“Desperate.”

“How desperate?”

“Terrifyingly desperate.”

He lifted his head, stared into her eyes, and then stepped into the shower with her. The hot water hit her and only fueled the fire. Pushing him to the back wall, she plastered her body against his, rubbing against him, tasting every inch she could reach. It wasn’t enough so she dropped to her knees and continued her very important work of licking and nibbling.

The sound of his approving groan bounced off the walls as she ran her tongue along the length of him and then sucked him into her mouth. As the water hit them she kept the pace tortuously slow and controlled, much as he’d done with her so many times now, quivering with anticipation for the moment when he’d lose his composure, thread his fingers into her hair, grab a fistful, and take over.

And indeed his hands went into her hair, but not to get a little rough or guide her. Instead, he pulled her away from him, lifted her up, and put his mouth to the soft spot beneath her ear, his lips applying pressure, his tongue reminding her of the wicked things she knew he could with his mouth. Then that mouth slid up to graze his teeth along her earlobe and down again to gently bite into the crook of her neck before laving the spot with his tongue.

Impatient with need, she pushed against him, dying to have him inside of her.

But he took his time, doing as she’d imagined, fisting a hand into her hair, tilting her head to nuzzle her throat.

His other hand teased her nipples before sliding south while his lips alternately nibbled and sucked, driving her crazy but not detracting from where that busy hand was headed.

Between her trembling thighs.

With one finger he traced her, gently rubbing up and down with work-roughened fingertips.

Her heart kicked hard. Her pulse was already racing, racing, racing, and she heard her own voice, hoarse with desire. “Tanner, please.”

But even as she begged, he teased. “You’re wet,” he murmured in her ear, a naughty accusation. “And not from the shower.”

She moaned, and then again when he reversed their positions and firmly pressed her against the shower wall and slipped a finger inside her.

“
Tanner.
”

“Tell me,” he said, voice thick. “Tell me what you want. Anything.”

His lips and tongue traced against her jawbone and made their way to her lips, but when she leaned in for the kiss, he allowed the connection for only the barest of seconds before he withdrew from her, making her suck in a breath of sheer frustration.

“You,” she gasped. “I want you. Here. Now,” she whispered against his lips, sliding her leg up his hip so that he’d have better access.

He let go of her only to reach for one of the condoms and then he was back, his mouth ravaging hers, his tongue pushing, stroking, reminding her of what he was going to do once he got inside of her. Her entire body felt tight, needy, desperate—until finally he slid home with one sure push of his hips and groaned her name.

She cried out at the same time, arching against him, close, so close to orgasm she couldn’t talk, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t do anything but hold on. Knowing her body as well as he did, he angled her hips to his, purposely maximizing her pleasure. One stroke, she thought. That was all she needed.