by Jill Shalvis
a little, making themselves at home.
“Soph.”
Not wanting to talk, not wanting to think, she went after what she did want. To lose herself in the only man she’d ever actively craved more than air. Wanting him to crave her back, to want to lose himself in her with the same intense longing, she turned to face him. Straining against the seat belt, she slid her mouth up the side of his throat.
He smelled good, so good that she had to taste. So she did, running just the tip of her tongue along the same path, smiling against him when he swore roughly, his fingers tightening on her as he shivered.
“Soph,” he said again, voice low now and also a whole lot husky. “We’re in a parking lot.”
He was big and strong, and yet she never felt overwhelmed by him. No, scratch that. She did feel plenty overwhelmed—by his innate maleness, by the testosterone and pheromones that rolled off him in waves, by how much he cared for her. But it was the very best kind of overwhelmed. Pretending that her entire life wasn’t in the toilet—again, or maybe the better word was still—she pulled him in as close as she could get him.
She both felt and heard the low rumble of his groan. It made every part of her react, and she couldn’t hold back. She nipped at his sexy throat, and when he groaned again, she pressed her lips to the spot.
Lose yourself in me. Let me lose myself in you…
As if he could read her thoughts, his hands tightened on her, one sliding between the seat and her back, sinking low to cup her ass, his other hand fisting in her hair to hold her mouth for his kiss.
Chapter 22
Jacob pulled back first, not wanting to make Sophie the center of any more attention than necessary. He was gratified to see she’d lost the temper and nerves in her eyes, which had been replaced by a sensual daze that raised the beast in him.
Shaking it off took a shocking amount of effort, but he did just that. He walked around the truck, got behind the wheel, and pulled out of the lot.
They didn’t speak, but the silence was easy now. Comfortable. And he realized it was always that way with her. He could relax with her in a way he couldn’t with anyone else.
He wondered at the potential fallout from today. Not for himself. He couldn’t care less about that. In fact, he and his siblings had had several business meetings with Lucas this week. He’d found him to be exactly the same guy he’d known in school—excellent at his job if not exactly a stellar human being.
But today business hadn’t come into it. In fact, Lucas had barely acknowledged him at all. That was good, leaving the business out of it, because Jacob planned to do the same when he paid Lucas a visit.
He parked in front of his cabin and turned to Sophie.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” she said.
No big surprise there. He got that. But when he’d first walked into the inn and seen her standing there, hair practically sizzling with fury, eyes bright, holding her own, he’d wanted to both cheer her on and slay her dragons for her.
It’d been hard to let her lead, but if he wanted a shot at making this smart, warm, feisty, amazing woman comfortable around him—and he did—he had to be the man she’d never let in before. “You ever wakeboard?” he asked.
She blinked. “No.”
“Your husband owns that boat and he never took you out on the water?”
“You’ve seen what he used the boat for,” she said.
Yeah, he should’ve beaten the guy to a pulp. “How about paddleboarding?”
She shook her head.
“Go change into a bathing suit.”
“What?”
“Preferably a really itty-bitty, tiny bikini. The ittier the better. Five minutes.”
Was he serious? Sophie wondered. Five minutes to be bathing suit ready?
Did he not understand the concept of having to check if she needed to shave? Insta-tan? Wax? None of which could be done in five minutes.
While she sat gawking at him, Jacob got out of the truck and came around to open her door for her. He offered her a hand, nudged her toward her boat, and then strode off to his cabin.
Nope, correction, he went to the side of his cabin, where there were…oh God help her…two paddleboards leaning up against the siding.
Over his shoulder he smiled at what was surely a look of horror on her face. “Never pegged you for a chicken,” he said.
That did it. She whirled and went running to the boat to change.
“Five minutes,” he called after her in a voice she imagined had served him well in the military.
Over her shoulder she flipped him the bird. The sound of his answering chuckle had her smiling as she jumped on board. Smiling, after the shit day she’d had. It was a miracle, she thought.
No, wait. Not a miracle. It was Jacob Kincaid.
As it happened, she did own an itty-bitty bikini, one she’d bought on a whim during a Victoria’s Secret semiannual sale. She had yet to wear it because it showed an awful lot of Sophie.
Screw that, she told herself bravely, stripping and shoving herself into the thing—and she did mean shoving. She inspected her legs and decided that yesterday’s shave would have to do. As for a tan, well, that wasn’t going to happen, so she might as well own her white-girl skin. At the last minute she added a short, white camisole sundress that gave her at least the illusion of coverage.
She found him waiting on the water’s edge in front of his cabin in nothing but board shorts, and at the sight, she tripped over her own feet.
Good Lord.
The man was ripped. He was leanly muscled from head to toe, and his shorts had slipped dangerously low, to just beneath hip muscles that could make a grown woman stupid.
He pointed to the boards, both in the water.
“How do I do this?” she asked.
“On your knees.”
She wondered if it was his voice or just the way he reeked of bad boy that made everything he said seem dirty. She went brows up.
He smiled. “Maybe later, if you’re good.”
She flushed and waded out until the water lapped at her calves.
“Not sure the dress is a great idea,” he said.
“Trust me, it’s a great idea.”
He shrugged and steadied the board while she got on her knees and tested her balance. He handed her a long black paddle and showed her how to hold it. “Stay on your knees until you’re comfortable,” he said. “You can push to your feet when you’re ready.”
She nodded and then watched as he mounted his board, not going to his knees at all, but standing straight up on his feet with an ease and agility that she knew she could never match.
“Hey,” she said. “Why don’t you have to start out on your knees?”
“I never get on my knees on the first date.”
She choked out a laugh, and he flashed her a smile that sent heat and desire, instead of blood, skittering through her veins. He pushed off ahead of her, showing her the best way to maneuver, and she watched him carefully.
Okay, so she watched his ass carefully. Hey, it was a grade-A ass!
He craned his neck and caught her staring, sending her a look that had her burning up from the inside out. Doing something with his pole, he stopped dead in the water and…she sailed right past him.
“Hey,” she said, panicking.
“You’re okay. Loosen your knees. Good. Watch your balance…Don’t look backward.” He laughed when, with a squeak, she whipped her head around to face forward again and nearly tumbled off.
“Steady,” he said. “Relax, keep breathing.”
She nearly told him where he could stuff his “relax,” but he was right. When she controlled her breathing, it was easier. Not so much like a cat trying to figure out how to swim without getting wet.
“Ready to stand up?” he asked.
“No!” She watched him move with such masculine grace and wanted to be able to do that. “Okay, yes.”
“Go down to all fours, with your paddle across
the front of the board.”
Once again her mind went straight to the gutter. But she went to all fours, wildly aware that he was right behind her, watching.
“Slowly push to your feet,” he instructed.
Easier said than done. Her sundress was caught between her knees and the board, holding her down. As she struggled to free herself, the board began to wobble and she swore the air blue. “Damn, shit. Fuckers!”
Laughter in his voice, Jacob said, “Don’t overcorrect…” just as she did exactly that and for a moment went on a wild roller-coaster ride without a seat belt, and then…
Fell face-first into the lake.
The cold water closed over her head, and she had just enough time to think, I’m gonna kill him, before she broke the surface, gasping for air.
She grabbed her board and hung on to it, narrowing her eyes at Jacob, who—smart man—wasn’t laughing outright. Nope, it was all in his eyes.
“How’s the water?” he asked.
Dammit, it was deliciously chilly on her heated skin, not that she was about to admit it. She waited for him to say, I told you the dress was a bad idea, or at least smirk at her clumsiness, but he did neither. Instead he crouched low and used his paddle to hold her board steady.
“Stay low as you pull yourself up,” he instructed, sure and calm.
It kept her the same as she managed to get back on. Sitting, her legs hanging off either side of her board into the water, she wrung out her hair. “You’re about to get a good look at why I keep my hair constrained,” she warned.
He took in the long, wavy red strands. “I love it like that.”
Okay, so maybe she wouldn’t kill him after all.
Her dress, which had been light and airy around her legs when dry, now clung to her like a second skin. A sheer second skin, emphasizing her hard nipples.
“I’m feeling a little self-conscious,” she said.
“That’s not what I’m feeling,” Jacob said. “You still going to try to paddle in that dress?”
Dammit. No. She pulled it off and wrung it out, sending Jacob a long look, daring him to say one word about her admittedly itty-bitty bikini.
He just smiled. “Nice. Really nice. You ready?”
“No comments on the level of itty-bittiness?”
“I was trying to be respectful, but you should know I had to roll my tongue back into my mouth to keep from drooling and that I want to worship you with said tongue from top to bottom and back.”
She both laughed and felt sexy, loving that he could make her feel that way. They drifted along on the water for a time. With maybe two hours until sunset, the sunrays slanted over the rugged peaks, making the water seem like a sheet of sheer, endless glass. Far beneath the clear surface, schools of fish swam, an entire world going on parallel to hers. Birds chirped. Insects hummed. Her heartbeat and blood pressure slowly lowered.
It was the most amazing, peaceful thing she’d ever done.
They paddled across the lake to the south side, which was forestland. Here there were no houses, just secret little coves and awe-inspiring scenery. “Wow,” she breathed. “This is incredible by daylight. I tried to stay here a couple of times at night but got spooked. No city lights, no one else around, and then there was the fact that the trees looks like three-hundred-foot-tall ghosts in the dark.”
He didn’t smile at that. Instead he looked distinctly unhappy. “Promise me you won’t do that again.”
“Be spooked by ghosts masquerading as trees?”
“Stay out here alone.”
She looked around. “You don’t think I could have done it?”
“Sophie, I think you can do anything you set your mind to. I just don’t like the idea of you out here alone and so isolated.”
Isolated seemed like a problem right now. In fact, like always in his company, all worries vanished. They slowed in a cove, drifting, resting. Jacob sat with his long legs hanging down over each side of the board. She lay flat on her belly and worked on her tan.
After a while, Jacob lithely jumped from his board to the shore and gestured for her to do the same. Knowing she could never do it with the same grace, she instead crawled off hers while he held the board steady, making him grin.
“There’s a path up to that cliff,” he said, pointing up about fifty feet above them, to a rocky overhang. “Want to jump off into the water?”
“Sure,” she said, eyeing the drop-off skeptically. “The day I’m given a terminal diagnosis, that’ll be the first thing I do.”
He cocked his head. “What are you afraid of?”
Um…everything? “The water’s cold.”
“You’re already wet,” he pointed out.
Yes, and just his words seemed to make her wetter. And as she sucked on her lower lip, he laughed low in his throat. “I can’t help it!” she said. “You have a dirty mind.”
“Babe, that’s all you,” he said, still smiling. “But I love it. Come on.”
“We don’t have shoes.”
“The path is smooth. It’ll be fine.”
Oh, dear God. They climbed the steep trail, Jacob urging her on. At the top, she stopped to catch her breath, losing it entirely when Jacob hauled her sweaty, sticky body in close to his. Palming her ass, he squeezed, smiled, and kissed her. “You’re beautiful,” he said, then flashed a quick smile, took her hand, and…ran with her right off the cliff.
She screamed all the way down and into the water, but was laughing when they surfaced, grinning at each other like loons.
After, they sat on the boards in the water side by side and watched the sun start its descent, making the water shimmer like a blanket of diamonds.
“Tell me a story,” he said quietly.
She glanced over at him in surprise. “Why?”
“Because you owe me a story.”
“How do you figure?” she asked.
“I’ve told you lots of stories.”
She sighed. “That’s not why.”
“Fine. Lucas upset you today, and I guess I want to know why you let a guy who you don’t love anymore get to you.”
Her gaze flew to his, but there was no judgment there, nothing but genuine curiosity. “I didn’t know we were at the discussing-our-past stage of the relationship,” she said. “Especially since we’re not having a relationship beyond checking each other for ticks.”
He laughed, the sound low and sexy. In nothing but those board shorts and a whole bunch of really great muscle definition, he made her body come alive and ache, damn him.
“You want to check me for ticks right now, don’t you?” he asked.
“No.” Crap. “Okay, yes, fine, I want to check you for ticks.”
“Too late,” he said. “I want a story.”
“The Lucas story.”
“Yes.”
She sighed. “I told you already.”
“Fill in the blanks.”
She shrugged. “We met my freshman year of college. He was in law school, so a few years older, wiser, blah, blah. I was a…pleaser. I’d do anything for a kind word. I’m not exactly proud of that.”
Jacob shifted and started to speak, but she shook her head.