Gansett Island Boxed Set, Books 1-16

by Force, Marie

  She swallowed every last drop and then licked him clean, leaving him a demolished, panting wreck. Every cell in his body quivered with aftershocks as she kissed her way from his belly to his chest. “Are you okay?” she asked in a husky, sexy tone that had his cock twitching like it hadn’t just been sucked to within an inch of its life.

  “I will be,” he said, eyes closed as he forced air into his lungs. “That was…just…wow.”

  Laughing, she stretched out on top of him, turning her head so she could focus her talented tongue on his nipple. As her piercing rolled over his sensitive flesh, he snapped out of the stupor he’d slipped into. His hands found the firm softness of her ass, kneading and stroking.

  “Oh, God, I love that,” she whispered.

  He squeezed harder. “This?”

  She shuddered and sucked harder on his nipple. “Anything to do with my ass sends me straight over the edge.”

  The way she said that nearly sent Grant straight over the edge—again. He’d never imagined being with a woman who was so open and frank about what she wanted in bed. Abby had always kept him guessing about what she wanted—and what she didn’t. She certainly had never almost swallowed his cock. In fact, she’d hated anything oral—giving or receiving. Grant had just been given a firsthand demonstration of what he’d been missing.

  Determined to push thoughts of Abby out of his mind, Grant said, “I’ll have to remember that.”

  Her hips moved provocatively over his reawakened erection. “Please do.” She squirmed up a little higher and pressed her lips to his, teasing his mouth with darting strokes of her tongue.

  Despite his best intentions, he remembered that Abby had always refused to kiss him in the morning until they’d both brushed their teeth. Stephanie didn’t seem to give a care about such details as she urged him into a devouring kiss. The sharp points of her nipples dragging on his chest and the press of her pelvis against his dick had Grant as hard as he’d been before she’d destroyed him with her mouth.

  “Condom,” he said between frantic kisses.

  She shifted off him, settling on her side with her head propped on her hand so she could watch him. “Hurry.”

  On the way to his duffel bag in the corner, he stubbed his toe on a table. “Son of a bitch,” he hissed, hopping on his good foot.

  Stephanie’s laugh was low and sexy. “Quite a view from back here.”

  After sending her a scowl over his shoulder, he rooted around in his bag, found a strip of condoms, ripped one off and tossed the others on the bedside table. Feeling like a teenager about to have sex for the first time, his hands trembled as he rolled it on. When he turned back to her, she held out her arms to receive him.

  “Do you want me to kiss it better?”

  His cock surged with hopeful enthusiasm.

  “Not you,” she said, reaching out to stroke him. “I meant your toe.”

  “It’s okay,” Grant said, even though it throbbed in time with his erection. He took her by the hips and dragged her to the edge of the bed, dropping to his knees before her.

  Without a hint of shyness, she let her legs fall open, inviting him to take whatever he wanted.

  He held her gaze for a long, charged moment before he ran his hands over the smooth softness of her inner thighs.

  She sighed in anticipation and lifted her hips in encouragement.

  Using his thumbs to open her, he bent his head to taste her.

  “Oh, God, yes,” she said, once again surprising him when she pushed his hands aside to hold herself open to him.

  With his hands free, Grant slid a finger through her slickness and pushed it into her. Remembering her earlier statement, he reached under her to squeeze her ass with his other hand. That seemed to make her crazy as she pressed harder against him, forcing him to focus on the throbbing bundle of nerves.

  “There,” she said breathlessly. “Right there.”

  He squeezed and kneaded her cheek as he zeroed in on her clit, sucking it into his mouth as he sank two fingers into her.

  She came hard, crying out and pulsing around his fingers.

  He couldn’t wait to again feel her tighten like that around his cock. With that in mind, he withdrew from her, stood up, arranged her legs around his hips and plunged into her.

  Stephanie threw her head back and moaned as he pounded into her.

  As if he was outside himself watching someone else, he went at her like this was the last time he’d ever have sex. Fueled by her enthusiasm, he bent his head, drew her nipple into his mouth and bit it lightly, mindful of not hurting her even as he took her fiercely.

  “Harder,” she said, startling him.

  “Which?”

  “Both!”

  He bit down on her nipple as he slammed into her again, the bed moaning and groaning under them.

  This time when she came, she screamed, a long, keening wail that had his full attention until her internal muscles clamped down around his cock and drew an equally intense orgasm from him. He came like he hadn’t already exploded only a few minutes earlier.

  “Oh my God,” she said, breathing hard. “That was unbelievable.”

  After he disposed of the condom, he rested on her chest, feeling as if he’d been hit by a bus. “I can’t tell you,” he said, sticking his tongue out to taste her sweet nipple one more time, “how sorry I am that I missed the finer points of that the first time we did it.”

  She chuckled softly as her fingers combed through his hair in a loving gesture that further twisted him into knots. She was a study in contrasts, his Stephanie—shouting out orders during sex one minute and soothing him the next. His Stephanie? Whoa, where had that thought come from?

  “Trust me, it’s much better with your full participation.”

  “We might need to do it again—soon.” He reached beneath her to squeeze a supple cheek. “I don’t think I gave your sweet ass quite enough attention.”

  She squiggled and squirmed, encouraging him. By tightening her fingers in his hair, she directed him to her nipple.

  He happily obliged, plumping up her breast with his hand and forcing the pebbled tip deeper into his mouth.

  “Mmm,” she said, arching into him. “That’s good.”

  She made him so hot. He wanted to lick her everywhere, bite her, suck on her soft skin until red welts marked her as his. He’d never before wanted anyone quite so intensely.

  They moved together, simulating intercourse. It would be so easy, he thought, to slide into her, but he’d never do that. Not without protection.

  “Hold that thought for a minute,” he said, kissing her before he sat up to get another condom.

  A sharp rap on the front door startled them.

  Chapter 13

  “Who the hell is out so early in this weather?” Grant asked as he reached for his boxers on the floor, mourning the loss of a first-rate erection.

  “Ignore it,” Stephanie said, tugging on his arm.

  “I can’t. It might be about Maddie or the baby.” The thought stopped him cold. “What if it’s bad news? I don’t want to know.”

  Stephanie came up behind him and kissed his shoulder. “Go find out that everyone’s fine, and then get back here. We’ve got unfinished business.” She punctuated the statement by biting his shoulder.

  A shudder of lust rippled through him, reawakening his libido. She was a freaking firecracker. “You’re going to kill me,” he muttered, pulling on his jeans while the person at the front door pounded harder.

  “Nah, you’re tough. You can take it.”

  “Be right back.” Grant walked through the house with a growing sense of dread. If something had happened to Maddie or the baby while he was rolling around in bed with Stephanie… The thought didn’t bear finishing. He swung open the front door to find his father there. “Dad? Is it Maddie?”

  His father came in and wrapped Grant in a one-armed bear hug since he still wore a bulky cast on his other arm. “Congratulations, Uncle Grant. Hailey McCarthy w
as born at five fifteen this morning!”

  Grant sagged with relief. “And Maddie?”

  “Came through it like a trouper. Your brother, on the other hand…”

  Grant laughed, imagining Mac frantic with worry.

  “All kidding aside, he held up rather well. I’m proud of him.”

  “I’m glad everyone is okay. I can’t wait to see the baby.”

  “Your mother says she’s a real cutie. The rest of us will get to meet her later today.”

  “I’ll look forward to that. Thanks for coming by to share the news.” A thought occurred to him all of a sudden. “Did you drive yourself here?”

  “That I did.”

  “Are you allowed to do that? Especially in a storm?”

  “Cal cleared me a while back. It’s all good.” His expression suddenly became more serious. “Listen, son, there’s another reason I came by.”

  Something about the way his father said that sent a twinge of anxiety marching down Grant’s backbone, the way it had when he was twelve and got caught skipping school. “What’s up?”

  “Stephanie.” Big Mac’s brows narrowed in what might’ve been displeasure.

  “What about her?” Grant had no doubt she was listening to their every word since his father’s voice had one decibel—boom.

  “It hasn’t escaped my notice that you’re spending a lot of time with her.”

  “We’re…ah…we’re friends.”

  “And that’s all?”

  “Dad, seriously, with all due respect—”

  “Don’t tell me it’s none of my business. Your mother and I met her last winter when we were in Providence and she was working at our favorite restaurant in Federal Hill. When we asked her to come spend the summer working with us out here, she seemed real excited. I don’t think she’s had the chance to travel much or visit new places. We like her very much. The last thing we’d want is to see her hurt, especially by our own son who is confused over another woman and trying to figure out what the devil has happened to his once-promising career.”

  Ouch! “Wait a minute—”

  “I don’t want you to hurt her, Grant,” Big Mac said more quietly as his expression became one of sincere concern. “I get the feeling she’s already suffered through some big hurts in her life. She doesn’t need another one.”

  “I’m not going to hurt her.”

  “See that you don’t, or you’ll answer to me.”

  “You did get the memo that I’m thirty-five years old, didn’t you?”

  “What’s that got to do with anything? You’re still my kid. Don’t you forget it.”

  “As if I ever could,” Grant said, smiling despite himself. He’d never been any good at staying mad at his irrepressible father.

  “I need to get home for a change of clothes for Mom. I’ll see you over at Mac’s later?”

  “I’ll be there.”

  Big Mac left him with another one-armed bear hug. “Love ya, son.”

  “Love you, too.” Grant stood at the door and watched his six-foot, four-inch father fold himself in his wife’s yellow Beetle. Laughing, Grant waved him off, closed the front door and returned to the bedroom to find Stephanie dressed and curled up in a chair.

  “What’re you doing?” he asked, noting that her eyes were different. Gone was the carefree expression she’d worn earlier. In its place was the closed-off, shuttered look that left him out in the cold.

  “I need to get back to the marina,” she said.

  “Why? We won’t open today without power and the storm still raging.”

  “I need to go.”

  Grant crossed the room and kneeled before her. “I don’t want you to go.”

  “Why? Because you want more sex?”

  He ran his hands over her denim-clad legs. “That’s not the only reason.” Hooking his hands behind her knees, he drew her closer to him and nuzzled her neck. “I like being with you.” And the truth of it was that he truly did. Even when she was driving him crazy with her sassy mouth, he liked being with her.

  Her hands landed on his shoulders as she tipped her head to give him better access to her neck. “I’m not looking for anything more than this.”

  “Which is what?”

  “Sex. Nothing more.”

  “Because of what my father said?”

  “Because it’s all I’m capable of at the moment. I’ve got a lot on my plate, and I’m going home soon. I don’t have the time or the capacity to take on anything else.”

  Oddly wounded, Grant said, “And here I thought you liked me.”

  “I do like you, and I like having sex with you. But that’s all it is—all it’s ever going to be. Okay?”

  He knew he should’ve been celebrating that this amazing, sexy woman only wanted him for his body, especially since he wasn’t exactly in a position to offer her much more either. Yet he was disappointed by her insistence that it could never be anything more than sex. “If that’s what you want.”

  “It is.”

  He could tell he surprised her when he scooped her up and carried her back to bed.

  “What’re you doing?”

  “The only thing I’m allowed to do.” Unzipping her jeans, he pulled them down over her legs and then returned for her panties and sweater. As he ran his tongue over her nipple, it occurred to him that he could very easily become addicted to the way he she responded to him. But then he remembered he wasn’t allowed to get addicted.

  When she fisted his hair to keep him anchored to her chest, he stopped thinking at all.

  * * *

  Laura was enjoying a cup of coffee she’d brewed on the gas grill the way her Aunt Linda had taught her when her Uncle Big Mac came in the front door of the White House.

  “Good morning!”

  Big Mac’s ebullient greeting eased some of the worry Laura had carried all night, wondering how Maddie and the baby were faring. “I hope you’ve come bearing good news.”

  “It’s a girl! Hailey McCarthy arrived at five fifteen!”

  Laura stood to hug him. “Congrats, Grandpa.”

  He kissed her forehead. “Thanks, honey. Auntie Linda stayed over there to help out with Thomas this morning. You doing okay here without any power?”

  “I’m improvising,” she said, gesturing to the coffee. “Can I offer you some?”

  “I’d kill for a cup.”

  “Coming right up.” Pulling on her raincoat, she stepped onto the deck and did battle with the wind as she retrieved the coffee pot from under the lid of the closed grill. She returned to the kitchen and poured a cup for her uncle. “I hope you don’t mind that I used the grill.”

  “Sweetheart, please. My house is your house. You know that.”

  Laura was mortified when her eyes suddenly filled with tears.

  “Hey, hey!” Big Mac took her by the chin for a closer look. “What’s all this?”

  “I…” Her throat closed, and tears spilled down her cheeks.

  “Aw, baby, come here.” He drew her in close to him, and she clung to the larger-than-life uncle she adored. “Whatever it is, we can fix it. I promise.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said, pulling back from him to wipe the dampness from her face.

  “Have a seat and tell me what’s going on.”

  Embarrassed to have broken down in front of him, she dropped into a chair.

  “Does this have something to do with why your new husband didn’t come with you this weekend?”

  Not trusting herself to speak yet, she nodded.

  “Aw, honey. It’s not working out?”

  Laura shook her head.

  Big Mac’s huge hand engulfed hers. “I’m so sorry. What happened?”

  She cleared her throat, determined to get through this without more tears. Honestly, she was amazed there could still be more tears. “Apparently, he wasn’t ready to quit dating.”

  Big Mac’s mouth fell open in shock. “What the heck does that mean?”

  Laura relayed the whole u
gly tale and watched her uncle become more furious by the minute.

  “What kind of guy does that?”

  “The kind of guy who’s the exact opposite of you,” she said, squeezing his hand, amused by his quiet rage on her behalf. She expected nothing less from him.

  “Have you told your dad yet?” Her father, Frank, was Big Mac’s older brother and a superior court judge in Providence.

  She shook her head. “He’s in the midst of that big trial. And with everything going on with Shane,” she said, referring to her brother, “I didn’t want to upset him. I’ll tell him when the trial is over. You know he felt so bad about missing Janey’s wedding, but with the storm coming, he couldn’t take the risk of getting stuck here.”

  “I talked to him about it. I completely understand, believe me.” He gestured to the wind and rain that pounded against the sliding door to the deck. “Looks like he made the right decision.”

  “It’s kind of nice to be marooned here.”

  “What’re you going to do now, honey?”

  “When I got here, I had no idea, but I’ve since been offered a very interesting new opportunity.”

  “Which is?”

  “I met Owen Lawry yesterday, and he gave me a tour of the Sand & Surf. Turns out his grandparents are looking for someone to run the place, and they’ve offered me the job.” Just saying the words filled her with the kind of giddy excitement she hadn’t expected to ever feel again after hearing about her lying, cheating scumbag of a husband.

  Big Mac seemed intrigued by the news. “Is that so? It’s been closed a few years. Probably needs a ton of work.”

  “It does.”

  “Are you sure you’re up for that? I’d hate to see you make a hasty decision that you’ll regret later.”

  “Well,” Laura said, her tone tinged with irony, “I dated Justin for three years before I married him, and look at how that turned out.”

  “True enough.”

  “Something about this opportunity feels right to me.”

  “Then maybe you ought to go for it. We’d certainly love to have you here full time.”