But looking at her didn’t work any better. Their gazes locked. Her face flushed with her passion, lips swollen with kisses, was a whole new kind of hell, the good kind. Justin leaned down, covering her body with his as she wrapped her legs around his waist, hooking her ankles together behind his back. The movement tensed her body and her sex clenched around him as he entered her again and again.
Justin slammed over and over into her heat. Deep, primal, possessive groans he could not stop erupted with each thrust as his entire world narrowed to the woman in his arms. He wanted her to come, needed her to come. He needed to be the man who brought her to the point where she let down all of the walls that kept her heart safe, that kept everyone at arm’s length. Justin needed to be the only man she let in.
Her orgasm hit and he reveled in the way that she screamed his name, dug her nails into his skin, wrapped herself tighter around him. Justin sped up his thrusts, holding her even tighter as he gave in to his own orgasm, coming with a roar buried in her hair and against her sweat-damp skin.
He held her close, shifting their bodies into a tangled mess of arms and legs and tousled blankets as they both settled back into their retreat in the trees. Sarina was quiet, her eyes shut as her fingers traced sweet circles on the skin of his chest. He could feel her withdrawing from him, her brain reconstructing the walls that she’d needed to survive.
Justin didn’t want her to shut him out. He knew that eventually it would happen when they both went their separate ways but he couldn’t face it today. Not after what had just happened.
“Don’t run, Sarina,” he whispered.
“I’m right here.”
“You’re running away, in here.” He lightly tapped a finger against her temple. “Just don’t. Not tonight.”
The silence dragged out between them and he waited for her to sit up and get dressed, to hurry back to her room at the house. But she didn’t do any of those things. She stayed, wrapped in his arms as the stars popped up in the sky above them.
But when she did speak, it wasn’t what he wanted to hear.
“I won’t run tonight but it’s what I do, Justin. It’s what I do.”
And he accepted it—for now.
Ten
“And this deal is done.”
Justin pushed back from his desk, setting down his pen as his eyes scanned the three huge monitors sitting on the large surface. The screens were filled with spreadsheets, charts and computations. A few feet behind them on the wall, large TV screens featured the major news stations on mute, covering the domestic and foreign markets. The screen to the far right had a running Twitch feed of one of his favorite gamers taking down alternative civilizations in a CGI environment.
But the stuff that mattered, the stuff that he and Adam had busted their asses to make happen, was going to work. The deal with Aerospace Link was going to solidify their leadership in the future of cloud-based technology.
And it was going to make them even more ridiculously rich than they already were.
More importantly, it was going to allow them to fund and mentor other scrappy kids who dropped out of school with nothing but Red Bull-fueled dreams and a couple of laptop computers.
“Are you sure?” Adam paced across the floor in front of Justin’s desk, his brows scrunched together in an intense expression. Adam was the worrier and he wasn’t great with numbers, so Justin walked him through it one more time.
Numbers were as basic as breathing for Justin. When words twisted up on him and made things that came so easily to everyone else so hard for him, so hurtful, numbers had been his solace. So he gladly walked Adam through all of it and showed him exactly how their dreams were still coming true.
“And this is solid. A sure thing?” Adam asked, gesturing toward the multicolored pie chart on one screen.
“Well, nothing is guaranteed but our part is solid. Worst case—we make millions. Best case—we make levels of fuck-you money that will enable our great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandkids to tell people to fuck off.” Justin went over to his fridge and pulled out two bottles of beer, popping the tops and handing one off to his best friend. They clinked bottles and both took a long drink. “Now, normally we don’t drink on the job but this is a celebration and we are done for the day.”
Employees walked by just outside the glass walls of Justin’s office. His space was on the same floor as Adam’s but at the opposite corner. They both had windows that looked out over the lush green campus of Redhawk/Ling and he loved to watch their employees come and go from the building, enjoying lunch or coffee in the sunshine on the patios, or exercising on the trails. Standing here, shoulder to shoulder with his best friend, it was a little...incredible.
“I can’t believe we’re doing this,” Justin said, nudging Adam with his elbow.
“I can’t believe we did this,” Adam replied, his smile huge as he waved his hand around like a sovereign viewing his subjects from the balcony of the palace. “I wouldn’t have wanted to do it with anyone else.”
“Me either,” Justin said, his voice tight with emotion. He wasn’t going to start bawling or anything but he loved the man standing next to him. He was more of a brother to him than his own blood and one day he’d tell him. Just not here in the middle of their business. He had a professional reputation to try to uphold. “Hey, Nana Orla and I want you, Tess and Roan to come over for a cookout tonight. You don’t need to bring anything, we’ve got it covered.”
“What’s the occasion? Other than the obvious?” Adam asked.
Justin shrugged. “Nana Orla and I thought that Sarina would love to see you. Get a little family time.” He walked over to his desk, moving aside piles of papers to find the documents he’d pulled about the center for Sarina. “She’s doing so great with the kids at Rise Up, Adam. Your sister is an incredible woman. What she has done with those kids is insane. I don’t know how we are ever going to find anyone to replace her.” He found the folder, placing it in his briefcase so that he wouldn’t forget it. When he straightened up, Adam was staring at him, a strange expression on his face. “What?”
“Are you sleeping with my sister?” Adam’s voice was even, raising Justin’s hackles. He couldn’t tell if Adam was going to hit him or welcome him to the family. They’d never really talked about his quickie-Vegas-temporary marriage to Sarina.
It looked like it was happening now.
“Yes. I am.” Justin wasn’t going to lie about it. Hell, Adam would see the two of them together tonight and with one look know that they were involved. “She’s my wife.”
Justin closed his eyes the minute the words had left his mouth. They were true but not the ones to say.
“Not for long.” Adam leveled his gaze at him, placing his beer bottle down on the table by the window. “Unless the plan to get a divorce has changed?”
“No, that plan hasn’t changed.”
“Then what the fuck are you doing, Justin? Sarina isn’t one of the many women you cycle through your life like food that’s about to expire. She’s been disposable her whole life, Justin. So I’m going to ask you again—what the hell are you doing with Sarina?”
I’m falling for her.
Shit. Where did that come from? Justin rolled it around in his head, over his tongue, let it settle in the vicinity of his heart.
Nope. It wasn’t romance. It wasn’t feelings that lead to forever and golden wedding anniversaries. It was just a sex-induced crush on a woman he admired and respected.
Justin didn’t do love and he didn’t do permanent. All the women in his life prior to Sarina had known this and Sarina knew it now. This was just a longer-term hookup and he had no business confusing it with anything more than that.
But that wasn’t what you told the brother of the woman you were hooking up with. Not if you wanted to live. “I care for her. She cares for me. We’re friends,” Justin replied, not
encouraged by the tightening of Adam’s jaw. “We’re working it out, Adam. There’s been something there since the night we met. We have...a connection. I don’t know where it’s going to end up but I swear to you that I’m not going to hurt her.”
“You can’t promise that, Justin. The only way to do that is to not get involved with her.”
Justin sighed, holding his hands up in surrender. “I don’t think anybody is going to get hurt. We’re two adults and we both know the score.”
The silence that followed was awkward. Not only because it stretched out but because Justin couldn’t breathe. His chest hurt like he’d taken a stray kick in the ring at the gym.
Finally, Adam huffed out his answer, his voice equal parts pity and warning. “I don’t know which one of you is the bigger fool.”
Eleven
“Did you tell Adam we’re sleeping together?”
Sarina pulled Justin aside, hissing the question into his ear as everyone filed down the buffet line and piled their plates with food. She’d arrived home from a day at the center and found her brothers, Nana Orla and Tess all on the patio with cold beverages and the boys fighting over who got to control the grill.
Tess had won the argument, and now she was Sarina’s vote to always run the barbecue. The food was delicious.
“Adam is giving me these weird sad eyes and Roan and Tess are giving him the cut-that-out eyes and then looking at me so I can only assume that you spilled the beans with my brother-slash-your best friend,” she whispered, looking over her shoulder to find Adam staring at them both, only to be nudged out of stalking mode by a poke from Tess. “What did you tell him?”
“The truth, when he asked me point-blank. I didn’t think it would do anybody any good to lie about it.” Justin moved over to the buffet table, grabbing a plate and adding a piece of steak and some shrimp to it. He stopped, sneaking a look over his shoulder toward her brothers and then back to her face.
Justin paused to consider something and then put down his plate, reaching for her and pulling her into a kiss. It wasn’t porn-level but it was deep, intense, wet, and left no doubt that they were more than friends. Spouses with benefits?
And everyone was staring. Not that she had eyes in the back of her head but everything had gone silent around them. Even the birds had stopped chirping.
They parted and Justin rubbed his thumb against her bottom lip, pressing another quick kiss to it before picking up an empty plate and placing it in her hands.
“Eat up, baby.” Justin grinned, then continued to load his plate up with grilled veggies and potatoes.
Sarina glanced over to where her family was seated, shaking her head at their reactions. Roan and Tess had their thumbs up, Adam acted like he hadn’t seen anything, and Nana Orla was fanning herself with her napkin and pretending to faint on the lounger.
Sarina shook her head. “Family is weird.”
When they finished filling their plates and took seats nearby, everyone decided to act like nothing had happened. She was okay with that. One hundred percent.
They ate their food, trading small talk while the sun set behind the hills and the solar lights cast a warm glow over the patio. This house was beautiful, the setting stunning, and tonight the company was perfect. Sarina soaked it in, pushing aside the somber thoughts about what they could have had if she and her brothers had grown up together instead of being separated. Would they have spent summer evenings eating hamburgers off the grill and trading inside family jokes? Would Adam and Roan have given her boyfriends the stink eye when they came to pick her up?
Would she have been braver? More willing to take a chance on what was happening between her and Justin?
Woulda. Coulda. Shoulda.
“So, Sarina, how do you like working at the center?” Tess asked, her plate balanced on her belly like a pregnancy party trick. “Adam says you’re doing great.”
“I love it. The kids are wonderful and so supportive of one another.” She flashed appreciative glances at Adam and Justin. “You guys did an amazing thing by giving those kids that place. Giving them each other. It’s something to be proud of. I hope you know that.”
“I knew you’d get it,” Justin answered, reaching over to cover her hand with his own. “And the kids. I knew you’d get them.” He turned and winked at Adam. “We don’t even rate anymore, buddy. I stopped by the other day and the first thing out of Little Pete’s mouth was, ‘Where’s Sarina?’”
“All I got was, ‘You’re so lucky to have Sarina as a sister.’” Adam mimicked the big guy’s booming, puberty-cracking voice. He turned his gaze toward Sarina, his smile tender and sweet enough to bring tears to her eyes. “But I have to agree with him. I’m really lucky to have you as a sister, Sarina.”
She cleared her throat, trying to pull herself together. There were things she needed to say, but this wasn’t the time. But she could set one thing straight. “I think I’m the lucky one.” She looked between her two brothers. “I’m lucky to have both of you.”
And she was lucky. Their family had been broken, torn apart by people in the system who decided that the three kids would be better off with families who could give them “a better life.” They weren’t the only Native kids who were taken from their parents and adopted by non-Native families, but having company didn’t make the pain it had caused any easier.
But Adam had found her and Roan and now they had a chance to be a family again.
Adam and Roan exchanged a look and she wondered what was going on. Roan got up and walked over to where he’d placed his messenger bag next to the back door. He opened the flap and pulled out a small package, handing it to her when he came back to the group.
“Adam and I had some things from our folks, things we managed to keep when they split us up. I don’t know how I got any of it when I was so young but it followed me around and I just stashed it away.” Roan pushed a long chunk of hair behind his ear, giving her a shy smile as he handed it over. “We wanted you to have it.”
She took the package, placing it on the table in front of her, squeezing her hands to stop the shaking. Justin scooted closer to her, his hand at her back, soothing and supporting. Sarina looked at him and he smiled, nodding in encouragement.
“Baby, go ahead,” he whispered, nudging the package closer.
“Okay. Okay,” she replied, voice shaky and thready to her own ears. With a deep breath she opened the package, sliding back the zipper and upending the bag to let all the contents slide out.
Photographs. Two of her parents. They looked happy, her mother sitting in her father’s lap. One of Adam, holding a football in a Pop Warner uniform. One of two fat babies—clearly her and Roan.
Sarina covered her mouth with her hand, choking back emotion. Tears slid over her cheeks but she didn’t wipe them away as she sorted through the remainder of the items.
A Christmas card signed by people whose names she didn’t recognize. A beaded woven bracelet with red and black beads on a leather strap.
And a CD. Linda Ronstadt’s Living in the USA.
“This was my mother’s.” She glanced up at Adam and Roan, surprised to see the tears on their faces. “This was our mother’s CD. The only thing I have from our home is a copy of Linda Ronstadt’s Heart Like a Wheel. I know it was hers because she put her name on it. I listen to it all the time.” She wiped away the tears and let Justin take her hand. “My only memory is her singing to me.”
“‘Different Drum,’” Adam said, nodding his head in agreement. “She used to sing ‘Different Drum’ to us when she was trying to get us to sleep.”
Sarina laughed. Really it was more of a snort joined with a weepy half sob but it was as good as it was going to get tonight. This was...a lot. Good a lot but...a lot.
Roan started humming the tune and Adam joined in. They were awful, tone-deaf, and any minute now Wilma was going to start barking.
Her brothers were awful but they were hers and now that she had them back, she was never going to let them go.
But she might temporarily lose them if they kept making the terrible noises they thought was music.
“If either of you start singing, I’ll punch you in the face.”
* * *
Justin buried deep inside her was the best part of her day.
“Deeper. Harder. Please.” Sarina pulled him closer, her arms and legs wrapped around his sweat-slick body as he drove into her. It wasn’t enough. She could never get enough.
It had been a long, incredible day. First, the kids at the center and the way they’d pulled together at the rock climbing wall and then the amazing dinner with her brothers, Tess and Nana Orla. The package of items from her parents had been overwhelming; she still hadn’t processed all the memories that it had dredged up.
It really had been one of the best days of her life.
They’d wrapped up dinner and all she could think of was getting Justin in her room, stripping off all their clothes and making each other feel good all night long.
But it wasn’t enough. Sarina strained, moaned, clutched him closer, and she needed more. Wanted more.
“Hold on, baby.” Justin flipped them both over, lifting his arms and resting them over his head as he stared up at her.
It was dark in the room but his body was illuminated by a swath of moonlight pouring through the window. He was smiling at her, his eyes roaming over her face and body, his fingers flexing with his obvious desire to reach out and touch her. Take control. But he knew what she needed.
She didn’t want to think about how that made her feel or what that meant.
Seducing His Secret Wife--A brother's best friend romance Page 9