Worth The Wait: A Nature Of Desire Series Novel (36 page)

He kept away from her clit, making her ache and plead as he thrust, but when he seized her hair and pulled her head back, using that grip to increase the impact of his pelvis slapping against her ass, the climax began deep and took over. It consumed her body from head to toe, squeezing her muscles down on him as he spilled within her with harsh noises of release she relished. His hand convulsed on her scalp. He kept working himself in her even after his finish. It was astonishing and unexpected, how hard he stayed past climax, milking every reaction from both of them before at last he slowed and covered her with his body.

He removed the kilt without leaving her, and adjusted them to their sides. He reached over her, putting the disconnected pump on the side table, and wrapped both arms around her. His thighs cradled her ass as he pushed himself in deeper, holding onto that connection.

“Oh…” Her vocalization was a sigh of satisfaction and wonder, and he pressed his mouth to her neck, holding her even tighter.

“Same here, love. Same here.”

She closed her eyes and focused on breathing, but as he leveled out behind her, she could feel the weight of his thoughts in a certain stillness to his body. She pressed her fingers into the channels between his, across her abdomen. “All right?” she whispered. It was just the two of them, but she didn’t want to make noise. She wanted the only sounds to be their breath, the sizzle of candlelight, the theater shifting on its foundation.

“Yeah. Are you? I was pretty rough.”

“I loved it. Do it again. Maybe in an hour. Let me nap first.”

His lips curved against her throat, but that stillness was still there.

“Sorry I was a beast,” he muttered at length. “Never had one I wanted to keep. It made me a little insane. Didn’t expect that.”

She folded both her arms over his, held on tight. “’S’okay,” she said.

Unlike him, she’d always known—or hoped—that was exactly how this would feel. There were a whole lot of lovely words other than
insane
for it.

She stroked his arm and let her breath rise and fall with his. She wasn’t surprised he dropped off to sleep before she did. He’d held the reins most the night and brought her multiple glorious orgasms. The man was entitled to be tired. She liked being with him while he slept. His breath heated her throat. His body was wrapped around her, his cock still partially inside her. His nose was buried in her hair, as if he’d wanted to take her scent into his dreams with him.

As she struggled against an exhausted sleep, she realized it was the closest to contentment she’d ever felt in a man’s arms. She’d never laid in bed with a lover like this, holding him and touching him with a hundred percent confidence that it was okay. Like she was inside his flesh and could feel the way he felt. She could think of him as hers.

She didn’t want it to be a temporary refuge from reality. She didn’t want tomorrow to turn it into an illusion. She wished she could hold onto this moment even longer, but she had to sleep. She couldn’t stave it off without sitting up, and she wasn’t leaving his arms.

As she curled her body tighter into the curve of his, she let herself hope that dreams really could come true. Then she slid into them.

T
hey had
the final showings of
Consent
during the next week. Julie was pleased with the confidence that built in her cast and crew, because in community theater the same players often came back for future productions.

Reviews remained positive, with only the occasional prudish naysayer. With twinkling practicality, Madison pointed out those would only bring in the curious, given their subject material.

Des and Missive remained the crowd favorite, though she could tell he was a little relieved when they finished the last showing. Performance really wasn’t his thing, and balancing it with a full time job was draining, even for someone with a passion for the stage.

Her rope artist might not have the theater bug, but he had boundless passion in other ways. Though she wished their respective jobs let them see one another every day, she appreciated the pleasure that delayed gratification brought.

She also liked how he seemed just as happy to seize the chance to see her, even if there was no chance of sex. Like today. He’d messaged her last night that he was building a playground on Sunday with the help of some Type I kids he mentored and contractors volunteering their time. She’d barely hesitated before agreeing to drive forty-five minutes downtown to meet him there.

He’d added the text:
Sorry for the less than romantic setup, but I really don’t want to wait another day to see you again. As long as you don’t mind sharing time with a bunch of kids and sweaty contractors.

How sweaty?
She texted him.

Nothing that would interest you. Skunk sweat. Normal contractor sweat. My sweat is an erotic anomaly.

That left her chuckling. She picked up some lunch on the way and brought her tablet so she could run through Harris’s production book details so far on
Done Right
, Lila’s play.

The playground was in one of the more run-down Charlotte neighborhoods, populated by blue collar lower income working class people living in small clapboard houses. It had always been a playground, but had fallen into disrepair, and Des had volunteered himself and some of his contractor buddies to help the local church spruce it back up. A number of parishioners had turned out to work on the grading and landscaping while Des and his team, along with the neighborhood’s more skilled carpenters, worked together on the playground equipment.

Since he’d texted her the “before” picture, she was delighted to see how much progress had already been made. Trash, vines and weeds had been cleared and were being replaced by mulched border areas with perennials and small shrubs, laid out beneath the several large shade trees in the lot.

Des and his crew were busy sawing, cutting, and hammering, the noise of power tools and men calling back and forth a pleasant din. They’d already put up the framework for the activities station that would have a climbing wall, parallel bars, rope bridge, a suspended path made up of tires, and monkey bars. A spacious tree fort formed the center piece. They’d wisely decided to keep an older steel set of monkey bars and parallel bars framing the new equipment, since both of those looked in good shape.

A swarm of ten kids appeared to be under Des and the other workers’ instruction as he combined the volunteer activity with teaching them building skills. He’d told her four of them were his Type I kids, so the others must be from the neighborhood. She wasn’t surprised that Des would include any kid interested in learning.

He looked damn good, which amused her, since he was coated in sawdust, his sweat-dampened hair scraped back with a rubber band, and he wore a paint-stained shirt and jeans. But men looked better dirty than women did. Everyone knew that, so her opinion might not be entirely blinded by lust. Though there was nothing wrong with a healthy dose of lust, especially when flavored with sheer delight at seeing him again.

He waved, telling her he knew she was there, and she settled on a bench to watch, knowing it was best to stay out of the way until he had time to take a break and say hello.

He’d pulled two of the children off to the side. Since they were standing by the old parallel bars, she could hear the gist of the conversation. He was explaining how to monitor and interpret their insulin levels when doing strenuous work like this. He had a good teaching style, conveying how important it was for them to know the information without condescending or lecturing.

“Right now, your parents probably check your numbers and stay on you about what to eat and when to take your insulin, but it’s really great when you take responsibility for it yourself, and know it all so well they start asking
you
questions about it. The more you prove you can handle this, the more comfortable they’ll be letting you handle it. It’s your body, your life. You start taking control now, you’ll be glad you did. You’ll grow up to be totally cool like me.”

As he said that, he’d gripped the parallel bars and turned himself upside down, hooking his knees over one of the bars. He finished the advice while hanging upside down, arms crossed over his chest, looking like a bat. The two kids jeered at him good naturedly. When one came too close, he grabbed the boy by the waist and turned him upside down, threatening to make him eat dirt.

She really shouldn’t be fascinated by how his biceps bunched when he did that, or how he held the kid so easily while he himself was hanging just by his legs, but hey, she was weak. His bill cap had fallen off, his thick ponytail falling along his jaw. When he released the boy to reach down and pick it up, he put it on the head of the other child, a young girl with pink sneakers and purple hair. Julie swallowed a chuckle, realizing Des had a purple streak in his own hair. Julie suspected the girl had a temporary dye powder or spray and had talked Des into giving it a try for fun.

He was so good with kids. She wondered if he wanted any of his own. She’d always wanted to experience childbirth. Was she too old? A lot of women did it later these days. She’d be happy to adopt if she was no longer a good candidate, but she imagined a child with Des’s eyes and smile, and their combined way of looking at the world.

Whoa, girlfriend. Ease up there. Way scary territory.

The slats of her wooden bench shifted beneath her hips, thankfully drawing her away from that topic. A woman had taken a seat on the opposite end. She looked about sixty and had a dandelion fluff of short white-gold hair styled around her pleasant face, combined with a bisque complexion that suggested mixed Caucasian and African parentage. She tucked a folder under her thigh as she took a sip from a water bottle.

Since she was wearing scrubs, Julie assumed she must be one of the neighbors, a medical professional about to head off for shift after checking in on how the playground was going. There were other neighbors spectating in the same way, watching from their front porches across the street, or camping out on the crumbling brick wall that edged the playground area. This bench was on the parking lot side of the playground where Des’s truck and the contractor vehicles were arrayed, so Julie had had it all to herself until now.

She didn’t mind the company. The woman was smiling at Des’s antics with the kids, which already convinced Julie to like her, but she never needed an excuse to strike up a conversation with a new potential friend.

“He’s a character, isn’t he?” she ventured.

The woman glanced her way. While she’d probably given Julie a quick once-over before sitting down, that automatic evaluation strangers did before risking proximity, the woman seemed to give her an even closer look now, taking Julie’s measure in an in-depth way that left Julie curious.

It was then she noticed the pattern on the woman’s scrubs. Horses, galloping, prancing and rolling in small tufts of printed grass. She wore a dainty gold watch and, on the same wrist, a friendship bracelet in gold and silver thread with knot patterns that Julie recognized.

“Oh.” She made an educated guess, pleased with the chance to meet another important person in Des’s life. “You’re Betty, aren’t you?”

“I am,” Betty replied in a rasping yet honeyed voice that reminded Julie of the Oracle in
The Matrix
.

Julie extended a hand. “Julie Ramirez. Des and I have been seeing each other for a short while.”

“Ah, I thought so.” Betty clasped Julie’s hand, softening her unsettling scrutiny. “You’re the mystery woman. I knew he’d brought someone home a couple times, but he’s been good about sneaking you in and out while I was asleep or working.”

Julie grinned. “I expect that has more to do with my schedule. I’m in theater and we’re always working impossible hours.”

“Sounds a lot like nursing.” As the children shrieked, both women looked up to see that Des had swung off the parallel bars. He was chasing the two kids as they played keep away with his hat. He could have caught either one easily, but was lunging and missing to prolong the game.

“Lord, he’s always had more heart than sense, but he’s so good with those kids.” Betty shook her head. “See the boy? Justice was terrified of anything even resembling a needle. Yet Des has him putting on his pump and testing his blood sugar like it’s nothing out of the ordinary. None of the drama and tears that were giving his poor parents gray hairs.”

“I’m familiar with Des’s powers of persuasion,” Julie said. “They’re hard to resist. Do you know how he did it?”

The crow’s feet around Betty’s attractive pale green eyes crinkled. “That’s a kind way of saying he’s stubborn as a stump. But he can be clever, patient and kind about it, which is often just what these kids need. Took me a while to pry it out of him, since he initially said it was a secret bro code between him and Justice.”

Betty shook her head. “He told the boy to imagine he was a super hero. Putting on the pump would give him powers against the evil Dr. Sharp, whose strength draws from fear of needles.”

Betty considered the thin boy as Des caught him, reclaiming the hat, but in their wrestling for it, his arm ended up around Justice’s back and the boy took the opportunity to give him a self-conscious hug. Des returned it in full measure, ruffling his hair.

“He told Justice that every kid who sticks his finger or puts on his pump without fear lessens Dr. Sharp’s power, so he can’t do bad things to make the world a darker place. I had the pleasure of being there the first time Justice put on his pump without fuss. Afterward, he was beaming from ear to ear. Des high-fived him and exclaimed, ‘See, it worked. The world just became brighter, right? That was all you. Your name says it all, man. Justice kicks the ass of darkness.’”

Betty used her hands, voice and widened eyes expressively to bring the story to life. It suggested she was good with kids herself. Since Des obviously held her in fond regard from his own childhood, that came as no surprise.

Julie watched Des put Justice up on the parallel bars, spotting him so he could hang upside down. The boy laughed and then yelled as Des and the little girl tried to tickle him. She wondered if there was anyone Des wasn’t comfortable around.

“So are you involved with the playground project, or just here to see Des?”

“I’m here to see Des, but he got involved with this through me. A patient from this neighborhood told me they were renovating the playground and needed skilled volunteer labor. I told Des and here he is, with his friends.” Betty smiled. “He and I go way back.”

“He said you were the nurse at the boys’ home where he was raised.”

Betty gave her another speculative look, as if she hadn’t expected that to be something Julie would know. “Yes. After he moved out on his own at eighteen, I eventually went into PA work. Physician’s Assistant. When he transitioned from an endocrinologist to an internist, as often happens when Type I kids grow up, he came to my boss. Now I’m his PA as well as his landlady.”

“So, was he a cool teenager? Give me something that will mortify him. How can I bribe you?”

Betty chuckled. “He was a very cool teenager.”

“I’m not surprised to hear it,” Julie admitted. “He mentioned he dealt with a lot of health problems. My takeaway from what little he said was that he had to be a pretty remarkable kid to be as good with life as he seems to be now.”

The personal note gave Julie the chance to convey the less than subtle message that Des had shared confidences with her, in case Betty wanted to be more forthcoming. She didn’t want the woman to betray Des’s trust, but now that she’d admitted to herself and him that she was falling in love with him, Julie wanted to know as much about him as she could.

Betty met Julie’s gaze. “I believe,” she said, with a look that Julie was sure had made more than one boy squirm, “this is where I ask you your intentions with regard to Des.”

“That’s a great combination of Southern traditional courtesy and ‘don’t bullshit me or I’ll stomp you like a bug.’” Julie shifted closer, turning on her hip to give Betty her full attention. “I’m falling head-over-heels with him and terrified he’s going to betray my heart and treat me like crap. He’s made it clear that he might screw up my life entirely, but the one thing he’ll never do is treat me badly.”

Betty blinked. “You do brutal honesty very well. But yes, you are right. Des won’t ever treat you carelessly. He’s guarded himself so long because he doesn’t want to hurt anyone. However, by doing that, I think he’s closed himself off from having a truly two-way relationship, where he can be given the gift of someone’s heart.” Betty gave her another searching look. “Perhaps that’s changed.”

“Well, let’s not go insane. It doesn’t say anything about his feelings. I could be a very charming stalker.”

Betty’s eyes sparkled. “I think not. He doesn’t bring women home, and I’ve never seen any of them visit him while he’s working.”

“Well, technically this isn’t a job site. Though I have been to one of those.” At Betty’s satisfied look, Julie held up a hand. “Okay, don’t freak me out, because being in love with him and okay with that is still new to me and porcelain fragile. Let’s go back to the impressive teenager thing and you telling me stuff about him I don’t know. If I’ve passed the initial test.”