“Smart woman.”
“She is. Gives Jaylon a lot of grief,” he said with a little grin.
“Are they a couple?”
Aaron gave a short laugh. “He wishes, but like you said, she’s a smart woman. Knows a player when she meets one. I like my partner. Smart. Good at thinking outside the box. Hard worker. But relationship material? He’s got a lot of maturing before he meets that qualification. At least he does if he wants to hook up with someone on Ramos’s level.”
“Oh, he does,” Brianna said. She’d seen it in how the younger detective couldn’t keep his eyes off the coroner’s investigator whenever she was close by. She’d dated enough men to pick up the signs of interest in any male. Even Aaron, who managed to control his better than any man she’d ever met.
Movement across the street caught their attention, as the four uniformed officers they’d sent in to search the abandoned building exited, three headed for their squad cars, one running through the rain towards them. Stanley growled low and jumped into Brianna’s lap as Aaron rolled down his window.
“Find anything?” he asked.
“No, sir. No one fitting your description of the steroid guy.”
Brianna leaned closer. “I hate to ask, but you didn’t find a dead body, did you?”
The officer shook his head. “No, ma’am. And we searched every inch of that place.”
“Good. Thanks for handling that for us,” Aaron said, briefly shaking hands with the other man before letting him run back to his cruiser then rolled up his window.
Aaron waited for both cruisers to leave before he pulled out onto the road. He glanced in his rearview mirror and Brianna swiveled around to look back at the old brick building.
“I don’t see anyone,” she said, straining to look through the rain.
“I don’t either. Just wanted to be sure someone wasn’t watching and would go in after we all left.”
“So now back to the safehouse?” she asked, turning around and snuggling Stanley close.
“No. Home.”
“Home as in?” She left the question hanging.
Aaron glanced at her. “Your place.”
“I thought Stanley was staying at the safehouse under police protection?”
“He will be. I’ll be there.”
24
It was another hour before they pulled into her garage, having stopped by the precinct to switch out the old sedan for her car.
“I’ll take Stanley out back before we lock up for the night,” Aaron said when they entered her condo.
“You know, I’ve got a very good security system here. Luke and Abby made sure of it,” Brianna said, feeling more nervous with him right now than she had with any other man in her life.
He closed the distance between them, cupping the side of her face with his big, warm hand. “I know that. But I also know we’ve been searching for a very smart, organized killer. More than likely, we’ve either seen him in passing or even talked with him. So, I’m not leaving you alone until he’s caught.” He leaned forward and kissed her softly, withdrawing before the little spark of heat between them could flame into something more. He stared down at her with those green-grey eyes that reminded her of a spruce Christmas tree. “Nothing else is going to happen between us tonight that you don’t want to happen. If that means I sleep on your amazingly comfortable couch again, I’m fine with that. You are in total control. Got it?”
Her heart pounding, a lump in her throat and her mouth suddenly dry, all she could do was nod.
“Good. Now, I have to get this little guy outside before he busts a kidney on your kitchen floor.”
She looked down to see Stanley patiently sitting between their feet, his little tail wagging. Seeing the hopeful look in his big brown eyes beneath the crazy hair sticking up in all directions, she relaxed and let out a little laugh.
“Okay, you guys go visit the bushes in the backyard. I’m going to have a glass of wine.” She lifted one brow at Aaron. “Do you want one?”
“Red?” he asked.
“I’ve got some.”
“Come on, boy,” he said, tugging on Stanley’s leash and grabbing the umbrella she kept hanging on a hook by the garage door.
As the pair exited the kitchen for her backyard, she pulled down two wine glasses from her cabinet then leaned against her counter with her elbows locked and inhaled deeply, then slowly exhaled. It had been a long time since she’d been intimate with a man.
Three years, four months and twenty-two days.
She’d grown quite comfortable with her own company and used to the idea that she didn’t need a man or sex to make her complete. An idea that would’ve been unfathomable to her former self.
So, what was this about tonight? Was she relapsing into that old insecure woman? One who manipulated men with sex to take care of her, to use them to give her a sense of self-worth?
Giving herself a shake, she looked through her wine selections. She’d started collecting them a number of years ago when she’d dated a huge wine connoisseur. The guy spent tons of money on expensive wines, but he did teach her about different kinds, how to tell a good one, and she managed to find some she liked.
So, for this night she chose one of her favorites—a Smith and Hook Cabernet Sauvignon. It had a bit of a cocoa and blackberry taste to it, two of her favorite things. She opened the bottle to let it air a moment before pouring two glasses, not too full but definitely enough to make them take the time to savor it. Her nerves were jittery, and she needed to relax.
You are in total control.
Aaron wasn’t being manipulated. He was also not trying to dominate her, unlike almost every man she’d known before. He’d made his desire for her—her, not just her body, but her the person inside—obvious by his touch, his kisses, the rather impressive erection she’d felt pressed up against her when he held her. Without a doubt the man wanted her.
He also respected her. From the moment they’d started this investigation, he’d kept her part of it. When she’d wanted to go find Paula, he could’ve gone all He-man on her and told her she had no business going to that part of town and he’d go take care of it. Instead, he’d included her in every aspect of finding and caring for her friend, securing Art’s crime scene, and identifying Mia. More than once he’d let her take the lead in the questioning of not only her friend, but the other homeless people and volunteers they’d spoken to.
And tonight, he was giving her the choice if they stepped over the line they’d been tightrope walking into intimacy, or continued as friends dancing around the sexual arousal their nearness seemed to intensify.
Was she ready? Could she change the dynamic rapport they’d developed? Did she want to? Would it make things awkward between them? Or, would it become something deeper, something stronger?
Before she could contemplate those questions any further, the backdoor opened and in came the wet duo.
“You wouldn’t happen to have a towel?” Aaron asked.
Laughing, she hurried over to the dryer. “I just happen to have done a load of towels a few days ago and haven’t had time to fold them.” She pulled out two, one she handed to Aaron, the other she squatted down and wrapped Stanley in before gathering him into her arms. “Geesh, you smell like a wet dog.”
He tilted his head at her as if to say, Duh, I am one, then licked her face as she toweled him down.
“Okay, that’s enough.” She laughed again and set him down on the floor, where he proceeded to the doggy shake, complete with the whap-a-whap-a flapping of his little ears. Then he trotted into her living room and made himself at home on the pillow he’d slept on last night.
“You can set your alarm now,” Aaron said taking the towel from her and putting them both in her dirty hamper in front of her washer. Then he hung his coat up on an empty hook by the garage door and hung the umbrella next to it.
By the time he was done, she’d entered the code to her alarm system and had corked the bottle of wine.
<
br /> “It’s a cabernet that I like,” she said, handing him a glass of wine then headed into the living room.
Aaron turned off the lights in the laundry and kitchen as he followed her, trying not to think if the offer of wine meant she’d made her decision. Making assumptions in his work lead to mistakes. He wasn’t about to risk assuming something as important as his relationship with Brianna in his private life. No matter what she’d decided, he’d go with it. He kicked off his shoes, stowing them under the end table and took a seat on the end of the leather sofa as she used the remote control to turn on the gas fireplace.
“When Luke and Abby were looking for a new condo for me, I asked them to get one with a fireplace. It takes the chill off the air even in the summer when the lake-affect storms roll through over Lake Erie,” she said, sitting next to him on the sofa, her body pressed into his side.
He draped his arm over her shoulder and took a drink of the wine. “Mmm, that’s a nice wine.”
“It’s not too dry, and I like the bits of coca and blackberry in it.”
Nervous babbling.
Aaron hid his smile and leaned down to kiss her on the top of her head. “I like those two flavors, too.”
She shifted her head to look up at him, bringing her lips closer to his. He moved just enough to take what she was offering in a slow, easy kiss. Then he sat back and licked his lips.
“Mmm, blackberry and chocolate.” Watching her take another drink of her wine, he set his glass on the end table beside him. Then turned to sample the wine on her lips once more. “And I really like them on you.”
She took another drink but didn’t swallow and kissed him deeply, letting some of the wine slip into his mouth. He swallowed it and pulled her closer, but she braced her hand against his chest and pushed him away just enough to give her room to drink in the last little bit from her glass and set it on the table next to his. Then she repeated the kiss, sharing her wine with him.
Heat coursed through him.
Hands on her hips he pulled her closer, until she was straddling his lap, her knees on either side of his thighs and her breasts crushed tight against his chest, as he kissed her like a drunkard needing more taste of the fermented grapes. When her soft hand cupped his face and she pressed her body closer to his, he swept his tongue over hers and sampled the wine, tasting the cocoa and blackberry and her.
A low moan escaped him as he pressed her hips down so that her heat nestled against his cock straining at the zipper of his jeans. For the past three years he’d been celibate. Not because he’d lost his interest in sex. The problem was there was only one woman who interested him since the day he met her. And right now, she was seated firmly on his lap.
A matching soft purr came from Brianna and he knew he had to slow things down before he embarrassed himself right there on her couch. Easing his pressure on her mouth and rubbing one hand slowly up and down her back, he moved her back just a little. The dazed and puzzled look in her big blue eyes as she opened them almost blew up his good intentions.
“Why?” she whispered in that very sexy voice of hers.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” he asked, praying he wasn’t making a wrong move.
She blinked, then lifted the corners of her lips. “Yes, very sure.”
Thank God.
“Then I’d rather have my first time with you be more horizontal.” He peeked around her to where Stanley lay watching them. “And without a four-legged audience.”
That got him a husky laugh. She wiggled off his lap and reached for the remote for the fireplace as he stood. Then she headed towards her bedroom. He started to follow, but stopped to eye Stanley, who was now standing as if to follow.
“Stay.”
The pup sank back down onto his pillow with his head over his paws as if in a pout.
“Too bad, buddy.”
When he walked into her bedroom, he stopped and sucked in his breath. Brianna was bent over shimmying her jeans off her hips, her blouse already discarded on the bench at the foot of her bed. Slowly she stood, laying her jeans over her blouse and turned to face him in just her pink bra and matching panties, reminding him of one of those old-fashioned men’s pinup calendar models.
“You’re beautiful,” he said, after running his eyes from her head to her toe and back up.
Slowly she approached him, until she was barely an inch from him. She slid her hands up his chest, stopping at the top button of his shirt. Leaning in, she pressed her lips to his once more as she slipped the button through the hole.
He rested his hands on her hips and pulled her in tight against his.
She slipped another button free.
Wanting to feel more of her skin, he slid his hands up the firm muscles of her back to the bottom of her bra.
“Not yet,” she whispered and loosened another button and then another.
Obeying her soft demand, he kept his hands splayed across her back, his fingers touching along her spine as yet another button slipped its moor.
When she finally had all the buttons undone, she pushed the edges of his shirt open and leaned forward to kiss his sternum, then licked up to his neck, his legs nearly buckling.
“Mmm, you taste so good.”
“Now?” he asked, his fingers poised over the fastenings of her bra.
“Please.”
With the effort of years of practice, he had her bra open in seconds, his hands pulling the straps off her shoulders and down her arms. She moved back just enough to let him bare her breasts, her pointed nipples grazing his chest with every breath she took. He tossed the bra towards where her clothes had landed earlier as she pushed his shirt off his arms to land at their feet. When he slipped his thumbs into the waistband of her silk panties, she shook her head.
“Not yet,” she whispered and pressed her lips to his in another sultry kiss.
Clearly, she meant to torment him, make him pay for slowing down the raging need that had hit them both on the couch. Okay. Two could play this game.
Shifting his hands, he cupped her breasts, letting his thumbs graze against her nipples. She sucked in her breath as she unfastened his belt and opened the button on his jeans. He teased her nipples again, making her lick her lips.
When her fingers started to lower the zipper on his fly, he switched tactics and pinched both nipples hard.
“Oh, God.” It was her turn to get a little wobbly.
She slipped her hands into the waistband of his pants and underwear, sliding them back until she gripped him by his ass cheeks. “I have been wanting to do this for so long,” she whispered. “You have such a fine ass, detective.”
He chuckled but took the moment to cup and squeeze her breasts. “I’ve wanted to do this for a very, very long time,” he said before lowering his mouth to her left breast and sucking on the perky nipple begging for his attention.
After that, things moved quickly. Finally, naked, they lay stretched out on her bed, him nestled between her spread thighs, his chest on her abdomen and his hands and mouth lathing both breasts with heated attention, alternating from one nipple to the other. Grazing his flesh with her nails, she slid her hands from his shoulders down to his lower back then back up again, arching her back to offer him her breasts.
“It’s been so long,” she moaned, barely above a whisper.
He shifted to the other breast, thrusting his hips forward to run the length of his condom-sheathed cock between her pussy lips. “For me, too, sweetness,” he said before latching on to suckle again.
“How…long?” she said through a gasp.
Setting his hands on either side of her body, he changed his position, lifting up to stare down into her passion-filled eyes, his cock poised to enter her. “Since the day I met you.”
With one steady thrust he filled her completely.
“Ohhh,” she moaned arching her body to thrust her hips against his. Tightening her muscles, she clenched him inside her, wrapped her legs around his thighs and gripped his ass
cheeks once more. “You feel so good.”
With a growl, he pulled back slightly, then thrust in again, at the same time latching onto where her neck and shoulder met.
More heat sizzled through her. “Yes. More please.”
Taking her plea as permission, he took control, sliding out to the tip, then pushing deep back inside.
Slowly at first.
She gasped and dug her nails into his flesh with each thrust. It stimulated him to quicken the pace, driving her closer to the edge.
“Oh, oh,” she moaned, just before he covered her mouth with his and plunged in deep and hard one last time.
Her body tightened as she reached the pinnacle and fell over into blissful passion, clinging tightly to his shuddering body as she rode the waves slowly to the shore. He eased his kiss, then released her lips to lay his head face down next to hers.
“I’ve never…” She paused to suck in air.
“Never what?” he muttered into her ear.
“Never came at the same time as—”
He claimed her mouth once more in a hard, possessive kiss. Rocking his body against hers, sending more aftershocks of little orgasms through her. “Oh, God.”
Then he lifted slightly, bracing his body on one forearm as he swept the sweaty strands of her hair off her face, a look of pure masculine satisfaction in his eyes. “I like that I’m the only one that’s ever given you that.”
Her heart swelled as she stared up at him and all of a sudden, she was sixteen again. “I like it, too.”
With a smile, he kissed her quickly, then slid off her body and climbed out of bed. She turned on her side and watched his fine ass strut towards her bathroom. Her nails had left a light scoring on his back and it made her giggle.
“What’s so funny?” he asked when he returned, pulling her up against him to rest her head on his chest.
“I left my mark on you,” she said and wiggled the French-manicured nails on her right hand at him.
He grasped her hand and brought it to his lips, kissing her knuckles. “Yes, you did a long time ago. Tonight, just put the exclamation mark on it.”
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