Warm Nights in Magnolia Bay

by Babette de Jongh

  Reversing the process was a little trickier; she had to lift herself out of the water while keeping the cast outside the tub, then get her knee on the scooter’s seat while holding the handlebars for balance—

  The scooter sailed out from under her and crashed against the wall while her butt skidded off the tub’s edge and hit the floor. “Ow, dammit!”

  Georgia yapped outside the closed bathroom door, and Quinn came in without knocking. “What happened? Oh, shit. Dammit, Abby.”

  As if she’d decided to fall on purpose. “Don’t yell.” Her tailbone hurt all the way up to her molars, and the inside of her left thigh burned like fire. “It’s not like I planned to do this for fun.”

  He scooped her up, seemingly oblivious to the fact that she was buck naked. Next thing she knew, she was on the bed and he was touching her just about everywhere, feeling for broken bones, she guessed, because he wasn’t being the least bit romantic about it. “Stop it.” She batted his hands away. “I’m fine. Please go get a towel.”

  “Oh.” He sat on the edge of the bed and ran a shaky hand through his hair. He gave her a surprised once-over, as if he’d only just now realized that she was soaking wet and naked. He bolted into the bathroom and came back with a huge folded bath towel, which he whipped out and draped over her like a tablecloth. The thing covered her from the knees up, including half of her face. “I’m sorry.” He dragged the towel down a bit so she could breathe.

  He patted her awkwardly—trying to pat her dry? His tanned cheeks flushed a dusky rose color. So now that he’d seen her naked, even carried her naked self from the bathroom to the bed, his primary emotion was embarrassment.

  How sweet.

  And infuriating. She scowled at the back of his head while he gently patted her legs dry. Did he not find her attractive at all? And here she’d been arguing with herself for two whole weeks over whether or not she should let him get into her panties, while he seemed to consider her to be a responsibility, nothing more. She sat up awkwardly and grabbed his hands, not caring whether the oversize towel slipped. “Quinn. Stop.”

  “Shit.” His gaze dropped to her breasts, then zoomed back up to her face. “I’m sorry.”

  Some kind of devil made her do it; she leaned toward him and wrapped her arms around his neck. “Stop apologizing.” Then, she kissed him.

  His tongue slipped into her mouth, tentatively at first, then with a bold exploration that ignited nerve endings from her teeth to her toes. With one hand at her back and the other behind her head, he laid her back on the bed and stretched out on top of her. Her knees fell open, and her hips formed a cradle that his hips fit into quite nicely. It was just getting good when he stopped kissing and looked down on her with a worried frown. “Is your foot okay? You want me to put a pillow under it?”

  “Forget about my foot.” She wrapped an arm around his neck and pulled him down. “Kiss me.” With his tongue stroking hers, her broken foot was the last thing on her mind, and she hoped it was the last thing on his.

  Even through the damp towel wadded between them, she felt his erection hard against her. She gave the towel a tug, trying to drag it out from between them, but he wrapped his hand around hers, stopping her. His blue eyes were serious, his jaw tight, his face flushed—but this time not with embarrassment. “Don’t move that towel unless you mean it.”

  She looked into his eyes and tugged at the towel again. He lifted his hips, taking his weight off her, and she slipped the damp terry cloth out from between them.

  He stared back at her as his shoes hit the floor, one by one.

  Thunk. Thunk… The sound of the invisible walls they had each erected between them falling to the ground.

  Hungry for the heat of his body against hers, she pulled his T-shirt up over his head and unbuttoned his jeans. Then, oh, glory, the rest of his clothes fell to the floor with a soft, tumbling sound, and his naked body skimmed against hers. Rough and smooth, warm and hard, he felt every bit as good as she had imagined.

  He rolled her to her side, and they lay facing each other on the lumpy old quilt some long-dead ancestor had so painstakingly stitched. He skimmed his fingers down her arm, a butterfly touch. “You know what this will mean, right?” he asked.

  She reached out to touch his face, feeling the warmth of his taut skin, the barely there stubble of beard on his jaw. “No, what will this mean?”

  “Everything.” He cupped her breast, lightly rubbing her nipple until it pearled up under his palm. “Are you ready for that? Because I won’t do this lightly. I’m fucking tired of cheap hookups, and I’m fucking tired of being alone.” His voice was deep and quiet, and just a little raspy. He swallowed audibly and looked away from her face, instead watching his fingers move over her breasts. “If we do this, it’ll be the start of something.”

  Goose bumps broke out over Abby’s skin, a thrill of excitement—and of foreboding. Ever since she’d met Quinn, she had toyed with the idea of having a fuck buddy she could take or leave—or take and then leave. It wasn’t her style, never had been, but her last failed relationship still stung, so she’d been hoping for a fulfilling relationship that came with an easy way out. Despite her fears and insecurities, she said the only thing her heart wanted her to say, even though the words came with a stomach-dropping lurch that felt like stepping off the edge of a cliff. “I’m ready.”

  Chapter 18

  Quinn wondered if those two words Abby had just said, I’m ready, felt as heady and exhilarating and frightening to her as they did to him. “You sure?”

  “Yes. Now stop talking.” She reached down, wrapped her fingers around him, and leaned in for a kiss. If her tongue hadn’t been in his mouth, he’d have gasped at the gentle pressure of her hand squeezing, then releasing, squeezing, then releasing, as if she had all the time in the world to make him come and didn’t mind spending it.

  If only she knew how long it had been, how close he was to exploding just by seeing her luscious naked body, just by touching her beautiful breasts and feeling her responsive nipples draw up into hard little beads.

  Time to take charge. But first… He moved her hand away from him. “Hold that thought.” Thank God he had stashed a few condoms in his shaving kit, just in case. “I’ll be right back.”

  He made it back in zero-point-two to find her burrowed under the quilt, with only her face sticking out at the top and her broken foot with the cast sticking out at the bottom. “You cold?”

  “Maybe.” But she was blushing.

  He climbed onto the bed and knelt over her, pinning her under the covers. “I’ll warm you up.” She squirmed, tried to bring her arms up, but he bent forward and put his weight on his elbows. “I think I like holding you captive like this.”

  She relaxed under him and her eyelids drifted shut. She lifted her mouth for a kiss, and he obliged, but on his terms. Slowly, slowly, he licked the seam of her lips with just the tip of his tongue. When her mouth dropped open, inviting more, he moved to kiss the upturned corners of her full lips, then her eyelids, her cheeks, her chin. He sucked lightly at the little dip between her jawline and her neck, where a rapid pulse fluttered. Not enough to leave a mark; he was careful to treat her tender skin gently.

  Also careful to avoid her cast, he sat up and straddled her hips, then began to roll down the old-fashioned quilt she’d covered herself with out of modesty.

  He vowed to himself that she’d have no modesty left after he was done with her. Exposing her delicate collarbones, he traced them with his fingertips, then followed with his lips. He brought the quilt down below her breasts and cupped the two perfect handfuls of soft, yielding flesh in his palms. The barest touch of his thumbs across her nipples made them contract in response. Lord, she was beautiful.

  She feathered her fingertips across his chest and pinched his nipples lightly. His stiff cock lurched at the current of sensation that seemed to connect those three seem
ingly unconnected body parts. His balls contracted, too, a warning sign that he needed to go slowly. He backed up out of her reach. “Nope, sorry. My turn first.”

  He folded the quilt aside and kissed his way down her flat abdomen, then explored her body more intimately. The just-bathed skin of her soft mound and even softer pubic hair smelled of rose-scented soap. The silky, damp skin below filled his mouth with the slight tang of salt and the elusive, compelling scent of a woman—not just any woman, but this woman.

  She grabbed his shoulders and made some token protest, some suggestion that he stop what he was doing and come inside her. He heard her voice, but he felt her body, and he knew which one to listen to just now. He learned the touches that made her tense and those that helped her relax. He learned what made her tremble and what made her inner muscles clench and pulse with reaction. With his hands and his mouth, he brought her almost to climax, just about there, then kissed his way up her belly.

  “Don’t stop,” she moaned, her fists clenching the bedsheets.

  “Not stopping,” he promised. “Just getting started.” He sat back and put on the condom one-handed while he stroked her with the other hand. The truth was, he was so turned on by the eroticism of hearing her pleasure and feeling her approach orgasm that he was about to come himself, and when he did come, he wanted to be inside her.

  He already knew that she was wet, slick, ready for him. But he still wanted to hear it from her. He kissed the outside of her ear, then whispered, “What do you want?”

  He hovered over her, weight on his elbows and knees, waiting for her answer.

  She made a low, growling sound, reached between their bodies, and guided him inside. Raising her head off the pillow, she bit the edge of his ear—not lightly, either. She bit down hard enough to hurt. Then she blew a hot breath into his ear that made him shiver. “This,” she whispered back. Clutching his butt with both hands, she lifted her hips and drove him inside even farther. “This is what I want.”

  * * *

  His body inside hers was an epiphany. This.

  This.

  He’d made her say it out loud, made her admit it to herself and to him. This was what she wanted. This was the start of something neither of them had expected, like finding a diamond winking from a fissure in a cracked sidewalk. Now that they’d found this unexpected gift, they could never go back to the way things were, no matter what.

  This was, as he’d promised it would be, everything.

  He had made the offer, then made sure it was her decision; and with that decision, she had grabbed his firm butt and driven him home inside her.

  He filled her; he more than filled her. Not just her body, but her mind, her spirit, her soul. All her fears and all her failures dissolved in that moment, replaced by the knowledge that from now on, she’d be his home, and he’d be hers. “Tell me what you want,” she whispered in his ear.

  He pulled out and then slid in again. “This.”

  He set up a slow, deep rhythm that brought her right to the edge of orgasm again.

  “And this.” In and out again.

  “And this.” Slow, easy, deep.

  “And this…” He kissed her neck, caressed her breasts, and battered her down below with an intensity that hurt even as it healed.

  “Yes.” She clenched Quinn’s shoulders and looked up at the sunlit ceiling where the fan circled lazily above the bed. Something inside her spiraled up and up toward that circling fan, and she experienced a sensation she had only felt once before, just before fainting. The edges of her vision dimmed, then sparkled, like stars in the night sky gathering toward the Milky Way while she watched from somewhere outside herself.

  “Oh…” She spoke to something inside herself that she’d never met but knew intimately all the same. “Yes.” She spoke to the sky, to the stars, to the coming together of a million separate elements she couldn’t even imagine. “Yes, please.”

  “God, yes,” she heard Quinn moan as he buried his face in her neck and slammed his body into hers again and again and again.

  Then neither of them could talk as their minds emptied and their bodies moved together in a mindless, wordless communion that knew more than what either of them wanted, or even what they needed. It knew…everything.

  * * *

  “Burgers and fries for dinner,” Abby decided after studying the contents of the fridge and glancing at the clock. “That’s all we have.” Because they had spent the day making love, then napping, then making love again instead of going to the store. “It’s also all I have time to cook, because Sean will be here any minute.” His visit was only for the evening, but for Quinn’s sake, Abby wanted to make it special.

  “Stop worrying.” Quinn kissed the back of her neck and pulled her away from the refrigerator, closing the door. “Whatever you have the time and inclination to cook will be perfect. Or I can take y’all out after Sean and I feed the animals.”

  He held Abby against him, his front to her back, and pushed his hips into her backside, as if they hadn’t already made love until she was sore. “You have no idea how low the bar is when it comes to Sean’s expectations about food. Leftover pizza, flat cola, and a handful of stuck-together gummy bears for dessert would thrill him.”

  “Don’t talk ugly about your ex,” she chided, pulling away on the pretext of reaching for a big bowl on the cupboard’s top shelf. Her ex-boyfriend, Blair, had vilified his ex-wife constantly for abandoning him and their daughter. Abby had bought into his story, only to realize later that he’d been feeding her a plate of bullshit piled as high as he could manage. He’d probably said the same thing about her, when he’d so ruthlessly cut her out of Emily’s life. The only difference between Abby and Blair’s wife was that he hadn’t had to drag Abby through court and accuse her of being an unfit mother, because he’d held all the power in their relationship. “You wouldn’t say that in front of Sean, so please don’t say it in front of me.”

  “I’m sorry.” Quinn took down the bowl she was reaching for and set it on the counter. “You’re absolutely right. Melissa is no Martha Stewart, but she is a good mother. She deserves my respect for that, and she’s got it.”

  “I know.” Abby set an onion and a green bell pepper on the chopping block. “I appreciated the way you took up for her when Sean was here before. It means a lot to me to know that you’re raising your son to have respect for his mother. Aunt Reva always said that a boy who is raised to respect his mother will respect his wife when he’s an adult.”

  Abby had once seen her ex spew ugly expletives at his mother, and she’d thought then, I hope he never treats me that way. Then she’d learned—too late—that Reva was absolutely correct when she said that a man who will disrespect his mother will disrespect any woman in his life. She had tried to influence Blair in a positive way, tried to help him become a better man, especially when it came to treating his daughter with the love and respect any child deserves. But he had invited her to “keep her big butt out of his relationship with his daughter.” Though Blair had used Emily to lure Abby deeper into his life, he never missed an opportunity to point out that the child she took such joy in mothering wasn’t her child.

  With a huff of annoyance at the rabbit hole her thinking had gone down, Abby attacked the bell pepper with a sharp paring knife. As she cored the pepper and sliced away the ribs, she reminded herself that her spectacularly poor judgment in choosing Blair was no reflection on Quinn, who was honest and decent and kind.

  Quinn started chopping the onion. “How fine do you want it?”

  Helping with the cooking without being asked? Her kind of man. “As fine as you can get it. I’m gonna mix the onion and some minced garlic”—she plopped an entire head of garlic on the block—“with the ground beef and some spices before making the patties.”

  Quinn broke apart the head of garlic and had just started smashing each of the cloves with t
he flat edge of the knife when his phone buzzed. “Guess that means Sean’s here. Can you grab it?” He turned his back to her. “Back pocket.”

  She dug into his back pocket and took out his phone, which was still buzzing. She hit Answer and held the phone to his ear. “Yeah, hey. Come on over to—” He paused. “Yeah? Okay, sure. We’ll come out.” He moved to the sink and rinsed his hands. Abby ended the call and handed over the phone; he dried his hands and took it. “Sean’s about halfway down the driveway, but there’s a big shaggy dog standing there who won’t let him come any farther.”

  “Wolf!” Abby felt a bloom of excitement at the thought of maybe getting Wolf to come to her this time. She turned the scooter and hurried after Quinn. “Hang on. Wait for me. Don’t scare him.”

  Quinn waited for Abby to catch up, but impatience oozed from every pore and surrounded him like a cloud. “It’s not the dog being scared that I’m worried about.” He grabbed the scooter’s handlebars in one hand and wrapped the other around Abby’s waist, hustling her over the flagstones. He set her and the scooter down on the gravel drive.

  Sean stood halfway down the driveway, backpack in hand. Wolf sat about ten feet away from him. “Hey, Dad,” Sean called. “Watch what he does.”

  As Sean took steps toward the right side of the driveway, Wolf moved to the right and crouched, elbows to the ground and butt in the air. When Sean went to the left, Wolf did the same. When Sean walked toward Wolf, he backed up, always keeping the same distance between them.

  “What’s he doing?” Quinn asked. “Is he guarding the house? Keeping Sean from coming closer?”

  “No,” Abby said. “He’s just playing. See how he puts his elbows down and his backside up? It’s called a play bow.”