by Lori Wilde
17
This time, she was going to make love to Jack. Really, truly make love with the man of her dreams. And indulge her naughty, secret fantasy.
They were sitting in the whirlpool, warm bubbles surrounding them, a glass of champagne in their hands, toasting themselves and their bravery. They had posted a bogus Out of Order sign on the door and locked it tight against the other apartment dwellers.
Jack had shaved off his beard, and he looked breathtakingly handsome. They were laughing and giddy, still high on their new experiences, their fresh expressions of love.
And they were completely naked, their clothes in a heap beside the hot tub.
CeeCee ran her hands over his smooth chin, happy to have her clean-shaven man back. His tan had started to fade, and he’d gained back the five pounds he’d lost, nicely filling out his muscular frame. He was Dr. Travis again.
Except for that lingering gleam in his dark eyes. Somewhere between playacting his twin and jumping out of that plane, he had developed his own wild streak. He was no longer afraid of adventure, and she was no longer afraid to love. Together, because of each other, they had conquered their fears and won.
At long last she had found true love, but best of all, she knew she would be able to keep it forever.
“I’m so happy it’s you I’m in love with and not Zack,” she whispered.
“Me, too.” His voice was husky with emotion.
“And I can’t believe I’m about to make love in a hot tub.”
“It’s my first time, too,” he smiled at her. “But first, there’s something we have to do.”
“What’s that?”
“Give me your hand.” She extended her arm across the tub.
“No, the other one.”
She switched out. He unclasped the charm bracelet from around her wrist and tossed it beside their towels. “You won’t be needing that anymore.”
“Satisfied?” She grinned.
“Not totally satisfied. Not yet.” Resting in the soothing water, watching CeeCee through half-lidded eyes, sent Jack’s thoughts tumbling back to the night before and whet his appetite for more of the same.
Water glistened on her smooth, bare skin. Her damp hair lay draped over her shoulders, framing the tops of her breasts. He grew hard. So hard he felt it straight to his brain.
Lord, she was incredible.
Steam rose up around them. He stretched his foot across the length of the tub and ran his big toe along the bottom of her foot. She giggled.
“What are you doing way over there?”
He was light-headed. High on champagne and CeeCee’s intoxicating presence. She smiled that bouncy, flirty smile of hers then coyly stuck out her tongue before ducking her head and denying him access to his favorite part of her. The window to her soul, the mirror of her heart, those stupendous ocean-green eyes.
“Would you like for me to come closer?” She peered at him from lowered lashes.
“Oh, yeah.” In the worst way!
Laughing lightly, she inched toward him, her champagne flute raised to avoid the churning bubbles. Her laughter sent him into a sensory overload. He loved that laugh. Wanted to hear it ringing in his head for the rest of his life.
“How about here?” she asked. “Is this near enough?’
“Closer,” he murmured, feeling very, very lusty.
She scooted nearer. “Here?”
“Closer.”
“You sound dangerous.” Her eyes twinkled, enjoying the game they were playing. He liked the game, too. Jack hadn’t felt this free, this lighthearted since he was a teenager.
He crooked a finger at her. “All the better to eat you with, my dear.”
She giggled again and covered her mouth with a delicate hand.
“I think you’ve had too much champagne,” he diagnosed.
“Only one glass.” She smiled smugly and raised a finger.
“You’re a cheap date if one glass of champagne does you in.”
“Not drunk,” she proclaimed. “A little tipsy maybe, but definitely not drunk.”
“You’re an incredible woman.”
“How so?” She arched an eyebrow.
“You’re a dream come true.”
“So are you.”
He slid his tongue past her lips. Her laughter dissipated.
She tasted so good! Like champagne and honey and heat. He kissed her. Hard and long and thoroughly.
“Wow,” she murmured when he broke the kiss. “Wow.”
“Just call me Dr. Love.”
“Well, medicine man.” She reached out for his hand and tucked it between her legs. Jack’s heart leapfrogged. “I’ve got this ache. Right here. Have you got a remedy?”
“Have I got a remedy!” He pulled her smack-dab onto his lap. Her thighs straddled his. “You tell me,” his voice grew husky. “Do I have the cure for what ails you, sweetheart?”
“Oh my!” Her fingers searched for his arousal and wrapped around him.
“Uh.” Jack grunted at the intensity of the sensation. He cupped the soft curves of her bottom in both hands and tugged her closer.
Her breasts bobbed above the water, shimmering with wetness, her nipples sweetly puckered. Jack lowered his head, placed his mouth over first one pink straining nipple and then the other. Her hands went to his shoulders, her fingernails digging lightly into his flesh as she moaned with pleasure.
She bumped against him with her pelvis. “My ache, Dr. Love, it’s getting worse. You better do something. Quick.”
“I’m a doctor who likes to take my time.”
He watched a trail of perspiration trickle between her breasts. He licked it, savoring the saltiness of her heated skin. He lowered his hand, came up behind her bottom, and slowly began to stroke her between her firm, supple thighs.
She made soft keening noises that told him she was winding up to something incredible.
“Make love to me, Jack. Now. Right now,” she pleaded.
Happy to oblige, he got a condom from the pocket of his discarded jeans and slipped it on. He lifted her higher in the water and up onto his bludgeoning erection, sliding deep into her sweetness. She hissed in her breath. Jack closed his eyes, relishing the glory of their joining, relishing CeeCee.
“Kiss me,” she commanded.
He roamed his mouth over hers, sucking, licking, reveling in her warm moistness. He slipped his tongue inside, feeling the rough edges of her teeth, tasting the wine’s tart sweetness.
She moaned, then leaned back, breaking their kiss. He held on to her with both hands wrapped securely around her waist. She moved over him, using her knees as a fulcrum to deepen his penetration.
They soared together on the wildest of roller-coaster rides, lurching steadily higher and higher, anticipating what was coming next, knowing there would be a frantic plunge, hurtling down into ecstasy as they climaxed together in one powerful shudder. Jack finally floated down from the nether reaches of passion, his breathing hard, his mind scrambled.
She lay draped over him, her face buried against his neck, her wet hair sticking to her face. From the waist up they were drenched in sweat. From the waist down, they were drained.
“I love you, CeeCee Adams.” Jack hitched in a breath, amazed at what he’d managed to accomplish in spite of himself. He’d won this woman over, freed her from her past, made it okay for her to love. He was so proud of her.
“And I love you, Jack.”
He kissed her once, twice, three times. Her eyes drifted closed. The pulse beating at the hollow of her throat perfectly matched the rhythm of his heart.
She wanted him. He, Jack Travis, and not his twin brother. No more pretenses, no more deception.
He kissed that supple neck, ran his tongue along that pounding pulse.
“I love your hair. It’s wild and free, spilling over your shoulders like a waterfall of fireworks. Wild and free like you.” A terrifying thought suddenly occurred to him. “I don’t want my love to change you, to pin you down
.”
“You won’t,” she said fiercely, wrapping her arms around his neck. “I only acted wild and free because I thought that’s all I could ever have. I never thought I’d be lucky enough to find my anchor. A man who isn’t buffeted off course by life’s storms.”
“But anchors can drag people down.”
“Jack, darling, listen to me. I’ve spent my whole life longing for someone to ground me, and that’s exactly what you do. We balance each other. I’m air, you’re earth. You keep me steady, I lift you up.”
She was right. So very right.
She inspired him to greater heights, to try things he would never undertake on his own. She lifted his heart, his soul, his mind. He peered into those laughing green eyes. She completed him and made him whole in the way nothing else ever had. He was her harbor, and she was indeed the wind beneath his wings.
And at long last, they’d both found their way home.
Epilogue
“I found a way to reverse the fortuneteller’s curse,” Jack said.
They were walking hand in hand on a secluded stretch of beach in Galveston, the evening sun sliding its way west, a full moon rising in the east.
“Oh?”
“Guaranteed.”
“But you said there was no such thing as the Jessup family whammy, remember?”
The last six months together had been perfect, idyllic. She trusted Jack, with all her heart and soul, but what if something happened that was out of their control? Giving up a lifetime indoctrination was difficult, and she was still working her head around the reality that she was living a fairy tale and all her dreams were coming to pass.
“Yes, sweetheart, but you’ve believed in the whammy for so long I figured a little exorcism ritual was in order.”
How did he know exactly what to say? She did need some sort of ritual, some sense of closure in order to shut the door on the past forever.
“So where did you get your information?” She slanted him a coy glance.
“I have my sources.”
“This wouldn’t have anything to do with the Romanian woman whose baby you delivered last week during your obstetrical rotation, would it?” she teased.
“It might.” His grin widened.
He stopped on a rock pier and pulled her into his arms just as the sun plunked down on the horizon. The wind ruffled their hair; the air smelled crisp and sharp. They were all alone, no one else in sight.
“So what’s involved?”
“It’s a two-step process.”
“It is?”
“Yep.”
“So what’s step number one?”
“I’m way ahead of you on that one. First, you take a negative talisman.”
“A what?”
“You know, something that represents the negative experience. In this case, your anticharm bracelet.”
“Oh.” CeeCee wrapped a hand around her bare wrist. She hadn’t missed the bracelet since Jack had taken it from her the day they’d made love in the hot tub.
“Anyway, you take the negative talisman and use it to make a positive one.”
“I’m not following you.”
Jack’s eyes twinkled and he pulled something from his pocket. A small black box. He cracked it open, and CeeCee stared down at an exquisite two-carat diamond ring.
“I had your bracelet melted down and used the gold to make the setting for your engagement ring. The diamond came from my grandmother. She and Grandpa were married sixty years. My parents have been married thirty-five. Long and happy marriages run in my family, CeeCee, so my history cancels out yours. This ring symbolizes the death of old superstitions and the beginning of our new life together.”
She raised a hand to her throat, her heart galloping a thousand miles a minute. “Oh, Jack.”
He knelt on the rock beside her and took her left hand in his. “CeeCee Adams, will you do me the honor of becoming my wife?”
“Are you sure?” she whispered. “That it’s really me you want?”
“None other, sweetheart. Until death do us part. Please say yes.” He looked so earnestly endearing, so full of hope and promise.
The sun had disappeared, but the moon had risen higher. Her stomach clutched. She wavered there in moonlight, the surf crashing into the rocks. She could choose fear, or she could choose freedom.
All it took was one little word.
How could she say no to this man? The one who’d loved her enough to pretend to be his twin in order to win her. The one who’d jumped from a plane to prove his love. The one who promised to stand by her through thick and thin, no matter what came. The one who’d so thoughtfully gone to all this trouble to fashion a very special engagement ring for her.
And how could she say no when saying yes felt so incredibly right?
“Yes,” she said. “Yes, Jack, I’ll marry you.”
“Oh, CeeCee.” He gathered her closer and rained kisses on her face. “I’m going to spend the rest of my life showing you how much I love you.”
For a long time, they simply kissed, enjoying the moment, enjoying each other, then CeeCee pulled away and angled her head up at him.
“Wait a minute. You said breaking the curse was a two-step process. What’s number two?”
“It’s going to be a sacrifice on my part.” He laughed. “It requires me to be adventuresome, free-spirited and spontaneous.”
“What is it!” she demanded.
“You sure you want to know?”
“The curse won’t be lifted until we do this thing, right?”
“That’s correct.” He grinned.
“So give it up, Dr. Travis, and stop with all the mystery. What must we do?”
“We must make wild, passionate love on the beach under a full moon and say goodbye to my bachelorhood.”
“Really?” she purred.
“Really,” he said. “We could start tonight and finish on our honeymoon in Hawaii.”
“What!” she squealed.
He pulled two tickets from his shirt pockets and grinning, he passed them over to her.
“You were pretty sure of yourself,” she said, lovingly fingering the tickets to paradise.
“Sure enough to count on you, sweetheart.”
“Well then, what are we waiting for?”
And so they made love under the full moon on the deserted beach, once and for all putting an end to the Jessup family whammy and in the process, ensuring themselves a very long and happy future.
Dear Reader,
Readers are an author’s life blood and the stories couldn’t happen without you. Thank you so much for reading. I do appreciate more than you could ever know!
As a nurse for twenty-two years, I brought my medical knowledge to this series and it was such fun using my background in the telling of these stories.
If you enjoyed The Jinx, I would so appreciate a review. You have no idea how much your input means to an author.
You can check out all the books in the Heartthrob Hospital series here.
Don’t miss the third book in the series, The Hotshot, where Janet falls for the absolute wrong guy.
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To check out my other books, you can visit me on the web @ www.loriwilde.com.
Much love and light!
—Lori
Excerpt from The Thunderbolt
From the moment Dr. Bennett Sheridan stepped into the operating suite at Saint Madeleine’s University Hospital, his freshly scrubbed hands held up in front of him and a toothpaste-commercial grin breaking across his cover-model face, Lacy Calder was a grade-A, number-one goner.
She glanced up from where she stood perched on her step stool spreading autoclaved instruments across the sterile field, preparing for an upcoming coronary bypass surgery, when she turned her head and saw him standing inside the doorway.
Her heart gave a crazy bump against
her chest, and her breath crawled from her lungs. Never in all her twenty-seven years had she experienced such an immediate reaction to anyone.
It was intense and undeniable.
Endorphins collided with adrenaline. Sex hormones twisted in her lower abdomen like a paint bucket in a shaker. Excitement, approval, and sheer joy sprinted through Lacy’s nerve endings as fast as electrical impulses skipping along telephone lines, wiring urgent messages to her brain.
It’s him! It’s the Thunderbolt.
Oh, my goodness gracious, Great-Gramma Kahonachek was right. He wasn’t some silly myth like Bigfoot or the Loch Ness Monster or the Tooth Fairy. Lacy was not the sort of woman who lusted diligently after complete strangers, and yet she was lusting after this one.
Big-time.
Step aside, McDreamy! Beat it, Doug Ross! Take a Hike, House! Move over, Dr. Dorian! Dr. Bennett Sheridan has arrived!
The man’s Mr. Universe physique begged her to caress him with her eyes. He was tall, well over six feet, and broad-shouldered. He wore green hospital scrubs, but the normally shapeless garment seemed to actually enhance his amazing body.
With his arms curled upward, still damp from the mandatory fifteen-minute surgical scrub, she could see the hard ridges of his biceps bulging beneath thin cotton sleeves.
He possessed spiced peach skin as dark as an itinerant beachcomber’s, and a firmly muscled neck spoke of time spent pursuing outdoor athletic activities. A tennis player, she decided, or maybe softball. His nose, crooked slightly to the right, announced that it had been broken sometime in the past, giving him a tough, no-nonsense air.
A fight, she wondered, or perhaps an accident?
His teeth, straight and white, flashed like a linen sail behind his widening smile. An accompanying dimple carved a beguiling hole into his right cheek. When his chocolate-kisses eyes met hers, Dr. Feel Good made it seem as if she were the only woman on the face of the earth.
Be still, my heart.
She felt an unmistakable “click,” as if something very important had settled into place. Something that, until now, had been sorely out of kilter and she’d never known it.