When had the waiter appeared? Maria burst into laughter, and pressed her napkin against her mouth. “Funny,” he said, keeping a straight face.
“I thought so,” the waiter quipped, giving Maria a wink.
Jake tsked. “Winking at my woman? There went any hope of a tip.” After signing the check, and leaving a generous tip, he walked Maria out, his hand possessively at her back.
At his car, he pressed her against the door and braced his arms on either side of her head. “I really do need to kiss you.” He lowered his mouth and brushed his lips over hers, a soft teasing touch. Then a little nibble at one corner of her mouth before moving to the other side. What he wanted was to thrust his tongue into her mouth and see if she tasted like wine and gelato, but he resisted, or tried to, until her lips parted.
God, yes, she did taste like dessert. He’d been gone for four days and all he’d thought about was coming home to her. And kissing her. And making love to her. And waking up in the mornings and making love to her again.
She rubbed against his erection, and he reluctantly broke the kiss. There were still things on his list he had to do before he could claim her once and for all. The evening had been planned out in his mind from the moment he’d visualized it, and as he drove to the beach, he listened to her sing along to the love songs playing on the radio. She had a surprisingly good voice, one that reminded him a little of Stevie Nicks, all throaty and sexy as hell.
That was something he hadn’t known about her, or that she would know the words to every song that came on. How much more about her was there to discover? She was a gift, one he wanted to tear the wrapping from in a frenzy and, at the same time, slowly peel the layers back, building the anticipation of discovering the surprise inside.
Her fingers danced over his thigh to the beat of the music as she sang along with Foreigner. Although he hadn’t realized it, he had been waiting for a girl like her all his life. Even though he’d fought it, some part of him had always known she was the one.
His skin rippled under the press of her palm on his leg. The urge to grab her hand and press it over his cock, aching for her touch, almost had him doing it. But that would be kind of crude, and he wanted tonight to be romantic and special. As if reading his mind, her fingers brushed over his erection and he jerked against the confines of his briefs.
“You’re killing me, Maria.” The smile she gave him was seductive and knowing. The little witch knew exactly the effect she had on him.
“I hope so.”
At the beach, he pulled into a public parking space. “Take off your shoes.” He removed his coat, tie, and socks, then rolled up his pant legs. Opening her door for her, he offered his hand to help her out.
“I used to run around barefoot as a kid and not even notice little stones,” she said as she gingerly walked over the pavement.
“We all did, I think.” He sighed in pleasure when his feet stepped onto still-warm, sugary sand. The moon was two or three days from full and cast a ribbon of yellow light across the Gulf. The waves were gentle, a rhythmic splash over the shore, and the breeze was soft against his face.
A perfect night for telling a woman he loved her.
Slipping his hand around hers, he listened to the sound of the surf as they strolled along the hard-packed, wet sand. She seemed content with the silence between them, but he wasn’t fooled. The question she’d asked almost a dozen times already was on the tip of her tongue, and he could sense the tension in her body.
Both he and Kincaid had made his trip such a secret that she couldn’t help but wonder what they were hiding from her. Each time she’d asked, he had said he would tell her when the time was right, and he was pretty sure she suspected he’d brought her to the beach to tell her something she wouldn’t like. Whether or not she would like it remained to be seen, but he thought—hoped—she would.
“You’re stalling,” she said. “Are you going on another dangerous mission? Is that what all the secrecy’s about? I finally decided you went to Washington to get briefed on something so top secret that they’d cut both your tongues out if either of you talked about it. Either that, or you’ve been in Tallahassee dealing with something to do with Fortunada, and you didn’t want to upset me by telling me.”
Jake grinned. Did he know his woman or what? Stopping, he turned to face her, cradling her face with his palms. “Wrong to both, Chiquita.” He kissed her then, and when she went all soft against him and circled his neck with her arms, he groaned and deepened the kiss.
This was different from the other times they’d kissed. Whether it was because he wanted her to feel his love for her, he didn’t know—just knew this was the woman he would always want in his arms. The only one.
Lifting his head, he stared down at her a moment. The time had come, and he wished his heart would stop trying to pound its way out of his chest. His lungs felt like bellows, and he was afraid the words would get tangled up with the air he was trying to breathe and nothing would come out of his mouth.
Do it and do it right, Buchanan. He dropped to his knees and pressed one of her hands between his. Tilting his head, he looked up at her.
“I love you, Maria Kincaid. Will you marry me?”
Amazing. He hadn’t even stuttered over the words. He had a moment of panic when she didn’t immediately answer. Then she fell to her knees in front of him, tears streaming down her face, and plastered herself against him.
“Yes, oh, yes, I’ll marry you, Jake Buchanan.” She leaned away and looked at him, and he felt as if she were peering into his soul, so intense was her gaze. “I thought I’d lost you after you came home. It hurt so bad.” She thumped her heart with her fist. “Here.”
When her tears turned to sobs, Jake held the woman he loved, the one who owned his heart, body, and soul, and made a promise. “I’m sorry, baby. I’ll never treat you like that again. I thought . . . It doesn’t matter what I thought, I was wrong.”
“Yeah, you were,” she said, and rubbed her face over the sleeve of his shirt.
Well, now he knew it was love because he didn’t mind at all that she’d wiped her nose on his clothes. He found her mouth and tasted the salt from her tears as he kissed her. “Forgive me?” he asked when they finally came up for air.
“This time. Next time you won’t be so lucky.”
“There won’t be a next time, I promise.” A wave crashed over their legs. “You’re going to ruin your dress.”
“I don’t care.”
“That’s all fine and good, but do you love me?” She’d told him before, but that seemed a hundred years ago, and he needed to hear her say the words again.
“I love you. I do. I love who you are and everything you stand for. I love your hair; your eyebrows; your beautiful eyes; the muscles that flex in your arms, making me drool; your toes; your—”
“I get the picture,” he said, laughing from pure joy. “Are you sure you don’t care if you ruin your dress?”
“This dress is up for anything tonight. Why?”
“This is why.” He put his arms around her waist and turned her with him onto the sand. As they lay on their backs staring up at a sky lit up with millions of stars twinkling like diamonds on black velvet, he entwined his fingers with hers and brought her hand up, placing a kiss on each of her knuckles.
For so long, he’d gone along thinking he was happy with his life, with the numerous women he’d taken to his bed, refusing to acknowledge there was something missing. He’d thought he could never settle on one woman, would never be able to make that kind of commitment. Never had he been so glad to learn he’d been wrong.
If there wasn’t one more thing he had to tell her, he’d cover her with his body and make love to her as the waves rolled over them. But there was, and any loving would have to wait. He lifted onto his elbow and picked up a strand of her hair, now damp from the wet sand.
�
�Cold?” he asked as he wound the curl around his finger.
“No, but now that you love me, I’m thinking you should tell me where you went.”
Damn, if she didn’t make him want to grin like a lovesick puppy. “I was wondering how long it would take you to ask again. How would you like to honeymoon in San Diego?”
“Don’t tell me you were scouting out honeymoon locations.”
Her feet were flat on the sand, her knees up, the bottom of the silky red dress draped around her upper thighs. Dark brown hair was spread out over the sand, and the moon hanging overhead was reflected in her eyes. She looked like a goddess come to earth, and he wanted to bury himself inside her, grounding her to this plane so she’d never leave.
“You’re so beautiful, Maria. If we could arrange for food delivery, I think I could spend my life right here just looking at you.”
“And I’d look right back at you, but what’s this about honeymooning in San Diego? Why there?”
“You have a one-track mind, Chiquita, but to answer your question, we should honeymoon there so you can meet your father.”
Maria ceased to feel the chill she’d lied to Jake about. Being cold, ruining an expensive new dress, and getting sand into various crevices meant nothing when the man she loved had asked her to marry him. This, she hadn’t expected.
“What?” She sat up. “What did you just say?”
“I found your father . . . I should probably say I’m ninety-nine percent sure I did.”
“That’s where you’ve been? Why? How do you know for certain? Is it Miguel Garcia? He’s the one who lives in San Diego. What did—”
He put his finger over her lips. “Easy, Chiquita. Did you know Chiquita means baby? I didn’t until a few days ago. I just called you that because I liked the sound of it, but now it has meaning. Are you mad? I’d hoped—”
“Stop it, Jake. You’re rambling like Professor Lumaris, and I always found him annoying. No, I’m not mad.” She pressed her hand against her chest. “I swear, my heart’s beating faster than a racehorse at the end of a race. Start at the beginning and tell me what possessed you to take off to San Diego and why you believe Garcia’s my father.”
He lowered his head and seemed to gather himself, then lifted his gaze to hers. “I don’t know if it’s occurred to you that you’ll have to testify against Fortunada when he goes to trial.”
It wasn’t something they’d talked about, but for sure it was something she’d thought about, although she’d been unwilling to share with him or Logan the sick feeling it gave her. If she had, she wouldn’t have put it past either one of them to find a way to make it appear her maybe-father had twisted his sheets into a rope and then hung himself. She could not—and would not—put that burden on either of them.
“Go on,” she said, refusing to reveal what she’d thought.
“It was something I couldn’t stop thinking about. If there was a chance you could take that witness stand and look the bastard in the eye, knowing he wasn’t your father, and put him away for good, then I was determined to make that happen.”
Only a few minutes ago, he’d told her he loved her. But those words hadn’t come as close to proving it as what he’d taken it upon himself to do. The hope of knowing her father, that she’d decided to banish, blossomed against her will. She didn’t want to be disappointed again, didn’t want to resurrect an impossible dream.
“If you’re wrong, I don’t know—”
“I don’t think I’m wrong.” He traced the outline of her lips with a finger. “You have his mouth . . . and the same eyes.”
“You met him?”
“Yes. I also met his daughter. She’s three years younger than you, and she could be your twin, Maria.”
Could it be true? She tried to speak, but no words would come. There were so many questions she should be asking, but she couldn’t think of a one. If Miguel Garcia really was her father, that meant Fortunada wasn’t. It was too much to hope for, and if it turned out Garcia wasn’t, the disappointment would be too much to bear. She’d managed to quash the dream and now here it was, wanting to come back.
“There must be a thousand things going through your mind right now.”
She nodded.
“While you work on taking it all in, I’ll tell you what I know so far. He agreed to a DNA test, and it’s already been sent to one of K2’s contacts, marked high priority.”
Didn’t they need something from her to compare it to?
“You’re wondering if you need to donate blood or something?”
She nodded.
His smile was sheepish. “Yeah, about that. The hair I took from you, I plucked some of it out and as long as they have the roots, that’s all they need.”
“And Logan knew all this? Knew where you were?” Her voice sounded shaky to her ears, but at least she was over the shock enough to talk.
“Yes, but we didn’t want to get your hopes up until we were as sure as we could be and until I’d met him. You know, to make sure he was open to having a daughter. Well, another daughter, one he didn’t know about.”
“Is he?” She squeezed her eyes shut, afraid of the answer.
“Very much so, Chiquita. In fact, he’s waiting by the phone for you to call him. If you want to. He would have come back with me if his daughter’s baby wasn’t due any day.”
“I have a half sister,” she whispered, hardly able to take it all in.
“You do. Her name’s Elena, and like I said, she’s the spitting image of you. It was kind of scary, actually, seeing another you.”
Tears mixed with her laughter. “You better not get us mixed up.”
“Never.” He pulled her onto his lap so that she straddled him. “Are you happy?”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
When Maria burst into tears again while furiously nodding, Jake spread his fingers over her nape and pressed her face against his neck. These were happy tears, at least. He slid his other hand up a silky-smooth leg to her bare ass, cradling a soft but firm cheek. That she cried wasn’t much of a surprise considering all he’d hit her with. That she wore no underwear definitely was.
“Chiquita,” he growled into her ear. “You’ve been naked all night under this dress made for sinning and you didn’t think it was something you should tell me?”
She giggled, and her lips trembled against his skin. “I thought it was something you’d enjoy discovering for yourself.”
Couldn’t argue with that. He glanced around to make sure the beach was still deserted. “A few minutes ago, you listed all the things you loved about me, but you forgot something, maybe one of the most important things.” He took her hand and pressed it over his hard cock.
“I didn’t forget. I was just saving the best for last.” She fingered the hook on his pants, slipping it apart, then unzipped him.
His breath hitched when she took him in hand and began to stroke him. Although she was fairly new at sex play, she learned damn fast. She leaned away and watched as she toyed with him. He braced his hands behind him, half reclining, and let her have at him for a few minutes. Jesus, she excited him like no other.
“Lift up your dress and touch yourself, Maria.” He brushed her hand away and wrapped his fingers around himself. She gave him an uncertain look. “Do it. Make yourself wet for me.”
Fisting the skirt, she held his gaze as she tentatively slid her middle finger through her folds. “Does this turn you on?”
“Hell yes, it turns me on. Can you make yourself come?”
“If you’d close your eyes and not watch, maybe.”
Was she kidding? “Not a chance.” He stroked his hand up his shaft, pleased when her gaze followed his motions. Whether she realized it or not, she began to mimic him, pushing her finger inside her when his hand reached the base of his cock, then playing with her clit when he moved up to the head. It
was the most erotic thing he’d ever experienced, and he imprinted this moment in his mind so he’d never forget how she looked pleasuring herself in the moonlight.
“Jake.”
He heard her need and reached up, lightly pinching her clit between his finger and thumb. Her eyes closed, her body gave a great shudder, and she fell onto him. The beat of her heart thumped, thumped against his chest, and he wrapped his arms around her back and held her close.
Mine, his heart screamed, and the whole of him was in complete agreement. Always and forever, she would be his. When she quieted, he pulled his wallet out of his back pocket.
“If you’re reaching for a condom, we don’t need one.”
He stilled. What was she saying? With everything else they’d needed to talk about, he hadn’t gotten to the part about the broken condom. If she was pregnant, he would be joyously happy but if not, a little time together before any babies would be nice.
“I’m on the pill . . . never went off them after Jonathan. Even then, he always used a condom and I’ve not been with anyone else since. So I’m healthy, you’re healthy, and we don’t need that.”
“Then you’re not pregnant?”
“No, why would you think so?”
“No reason.” He lowered his mouth and nuzzled her neck, a little surprised he was disappointed she wasn’t pregnant. “How do you know I’m healthy?”
“I know everything. You had a company physical right before you left for Egypt and it came back clean.”
“And you know this how?”
She gave a little snort. “Seriously? Along with accounting, payroll, and all the other stuff, I’m also in charge of human resources. I saw the report from the doctor.”
It was something he’d never thought to wonder about, where those reports from the doctor went. K2 required an annual physical, so he went and then forgot about it. He stuck the wallet back into his pocket.
Smiling, she rocked against him. “Love me, Jake.”
“My heart’s desire,” he answered and slid into her. Sweet Jesus, he never could have imagined how good it would feel without a rubbery barrier between them.
Someone Like Her (A K2 Team Novel) Page 26