Glancing over his shoulder at the chaos, Alec caged Lilly against the wall with his body, instinctively protecting her from flying elbows and stomping feet. “Turn on the lights,” he yelled, trying to be heard over the din. “For God’s sake, someone turn on the lights.”
But when the darkness remained as black as ever, he pulled back a few inches from Lilly. “Wait here,” he said, unwilling to haul her through the panicking crowd. “Wait right here and I’ll be back for you, I promise.”
It didn’t register, then, that she hadn’t made a sound.
Long minutes passed as he made his way out of the building to an outside courtyard that was as dark as inside the facility. The landscape lighting was out or off as well. As patrons continued to stream from the building, Alec caught sight of his second cousin, Kane, jogging forward with flashlight in hand.
Alec flagged him down. “What the hell happened?”
“One of the night maintenance guys hit a transformer with his truck. The electricity’s out at this part of the resort.”
“Everyone’s cell phones were checked.”
“Yeah. Someone already brought them back to the lobby. You can pick yours up there. Five minutes and we’ll have staff lighting the way.”
“Good. Okay. Anything I can do?”
“Nope. All in a night’s work in the hospitality biz.” Kane grinned. “Gotta go.”
“Yeah.”
Alec redirected his attention to the building’s exit, where men and women straggled through, their relieved expressions discernible as more staff arrived with portable lanterns. He expected Lilly any second, but as the line of people coming out of the structure trickled to nothing, he still didn’t spy her.
Where was she? Had she left from some other exit or had he missed her while talking with Kane?
Then Alec thought of his instructions. Wait right here and I’ll be back for you, I promise.
With a curse, he ran for the entrance where a skinny guy was just crossing the threshold, a small flashlight in hand. “Everybody’s out, man,” he said. In the glow from the lanterns, Alec saw his polo shirt read “Oscuro Events.” Oscuru was “dark” in Spanish.
“I’ll just check for myself.” Alec grabbed the flashlight from the guy and shouldered past him.
Maybe it was Alec’s air of authority, or his grimace of worry, but the other man didn’t object as he rushed into the still-dark space and the heavy door closed behind him.
Trying to get his bearings, Alec glanced around as he moved farther inside. The coasters had dimmed to nearly nothing and his feet crunched over broken glass.
“Lilly?” he called softly, some instinct warning him to go gently. “Are you here, sugar?”
A sound alerted him to the left rear of the room. A stifled sob?
“It’s Alec,” he said, following the noise. “I came back for you. All’s well now.”
Running the flashlight’s small spot of yellow illumination around the area, he noticed that a belly table had been knocked over. As he drew nearer, he could make out a small figure sheltered behind it, her legs folded to her chest, arms surrounding them, forehead to her knees. Something moved through his chest, more than relief, more than sympathy. Tenderness, both sharp and sweet, like a paper cut, he thought, as he dragged the piece of furniture away from Lilly.
He crouched down. “Are you hurt?”
Her head shot up. She shook it.
“Okay.” Instead of drawing her to her feet immediately, he operated on instinct and dropped to the floor beside her. “Other than not hurt, how are you?”
“Fabulous,” she said, with a faint heartiness that didn’t have him fooled. With her lousy sense of direction, the dark and the chaos had likely confused and alarmed her, big time. “Really, I’m just fine. I needed a moment to…to get my bearings, so I took a seat right here.”
Still obeying instinct, he lifted Lilly to sit sideways on his lap.
“Hey,” she protested, struggling. “What are you—”
“Shh.” He wrapped his arms around her, trying to cease her wiggling. “I need a moment now. I got a little rattled myself when I couldn’t find you.”
Her movements subsided. “Oh, all right,” she said, as if put out. But when she relaxed into the curve of his body, he felt a tremor run through her.
He tightened his hold and pressed a soft kiss to the top of her hair. “Why didn’t you leave with the others? Were you terribly disoriented?”
After a long moment she answered. “You promised you’d come back for me.”
Another paper cut, and then another, a thousand of them, all torturous and all so fucking gratifying as well, because Lilly’s words implied she trusted him—or at least wanted to. You promised you’d come back for me. And she’d waited for him.
God, Alec thought. The idea of that hurt so damn good.
He squeezed shut his eyes to ride out the ache even as he pulled her more closely against him, all the while aware it was sending the wrong message. He of all people should know never to promise anything.
Chapter 6
Lilly had lied.
When Alec found her sitting on the floor, she hadn’t been fabulous or anything close to fine.
The explosive sound, the breaking glass, the shouts had sent her into an instant mental tailspin. Before Alec had even left her side she’d retreated inside her head and became once again that little kid who locked herself into the hall closet while her aunt and uncle’s “passion” raged on.
Not until Alec returned had she realized that the space surrounding her had cleared of other people. Not until he lifted her onto his lap and wrapped her in his warm arms had she breathed easy.
Everybody had their little quirks, she consoled herself.
“What happened?” she asked him now, sounding drowsy. A lethargy was overtaking her body as adrenaline seeped from her system.
His voice rumbled in his chest and was a deep hum against her body. “Nothing dire. A vehicle ran into a transformer and the power’s out.”
“Everywhere?” Her heart sped up again at the thought she’d have to spend the night without light. Even the closet had not been completely impenetrable. A crack at the bottom of the door had been enough to illuminate the scruffy toes of her sneakers as she sat curled in the cramped, dusty-smelling space.
“No,” Alec said, and he lifted one hand to smooth her hair from her face, a gesture both soothing and intimate. “But even if it was, we’d get your cell phone back and scare up a few flashlights.”
“Right.” No need to panic. Again.
“What about you, Lilly?” he asked quietly. “What happened to you?”
She held herself very still. “I told you about my bad sense of direction. When I heard the explosion, the screams, the breaking glass, I just sort of…got lost.”
“My question wasn’t about tonight, Lily.”
Her heart started thumping madly. He’d sensed there was something more complicated behind her reaction. Her face burned with shame and she fought the urge to bend into herself like a pill bug, protecting her sensitive underbelly.
“I-I don’t know what you mean,” she finally managed to croak out.
“Okay,” he said, stroking her hair from her forehead again. “It’s okay, Lilly. You don’t have to answer.”
Letting her head fall to his shoulder, she allowed her tense limbs to relax again. He continued the soothing caresses, the silence between them a balm to the last of her tattered nerves.
Lassitude swept her again and an odd thought drifted into her brain. What if she told him? What if she explained about being abandoned by her mother and about her aunt and uncle and the defect in her bloodline?
This is how Durands love.
“Are you going to take a nap on me?” he asked, his voice amused.
“Maybe,” she admitted, trying to ignore the temptation to let down her guard and tell Alec everything she kept behind her wire-wrapped heart. Audra knew the basic details, but Lily had never tol
d those to any man and even her best friend didn’t know how it felt to have such a tenuous hold on survival.
As far back as she remembered, her aunt and uncle had threatened to kick her out of their apartment, or worse, pack up and leave and not take her with them.
To her despair, those experiences had only served to feed her most private, unspoken, and deep-set need for roots and real family, even as she knew she didn’t have the tools or the bravery to try and satisfy it. If you didn’t strive for something, it wouldn’t hurt when you failed to achieve it.
Once she’d met Audra, Lilly had lived in the Montgomery orbit, trying not to take up too much space, but basking in the outer edges of the sunshine they created as a unit.
The Thatchers radiated that same nourishing warmth, she thought. Stability. Security. Which meant Alec would never understand her or her situation and he’d likely offer up in return an embarrassed pity if she told him about it. People like him didn’t want to know there was ugliness and upset in the world. He would resent her for lifting the screen.
She stirred in the warm cup of his big body, thinking that he couldn’t be comfortable, and knowing she’d have to exit the comfort of his arms at some point. “I’m too heavy,” she said.
“You’re a feather.”
A low note in his voice had her turning her head to glance up at him. “Are you falling asleep too?”
“No.” As he stared down at her, that power he held to weave a cocoon around them was at work again. The surrounding darkness became velvet curtains enclosing them and she wasn’t afraid or upset to have lost her sense of direction again. If she held a compass it would point to Alec as true north and she couldn’t look away from him as his mouth lowered to hers.
Lilly’s limbs went heavy and her stomach seemed to float upward as she breathlessly anticipated the kiss. Maybe she should demur, but there wasn’t a chance of that occurring, no chance at all.
His breath rushed out, making her lips tingle. Then his tongue traced the edges of them, a tickle that he soothed with a soft swipe across her lower lip.
Her mouth opened and he surged inside.
Lilly’s nipples tightened in a rush and a pulse throbbed between her legs. She felt heavy there, too, swollen and ripening as he deepened the kiss.
Squirming in his lap, she heard him groan as her hip pressed against the stiffening erection there. He adjusted her, hitching her into a different position, and his fingers found her bare thigh, the skin revealed because the hem of her dress had ridden high on her leg.
He stilled.
Then his mouth became more demanding, the kiss scorching her lips, setting fire to her blood. She wiggled again, trying to get closer to him, her need near-desperate. Desire had never before caught her like this, sweeping her up and leaving her thoughts and concerns behind.
Helpless, she thought, and wondered why the idea didn’t terrify her.
“Alec,” she said, dragging her fingers through his hair and holding him to her. “Alec.”
One of his hands soothed her, running down her side, but then his fingers found the hem of her silky dress and he groaned. His palm burned as he pushed it higher to follow the curve of her flank to her hip. He toyed with the edge of her panties there and Lilly moaned.
Lifting his head, he drew in a fast breath. “Sugar. Sugar, I’ve got to touch you.”
Her tongue drew a line along his jaw.
“God,” he said, shaking his head as if to clear it. “Let me…let me…”
“Yes,” she murmured, shivering as he traced the elastic line of her underwear with one fingertip. “Anything you want.”
Distant warning bells sounded at that remark, but they receded as he adjusted her on his lap again. Her back to his front now, and he spread her legs over his. She bucked at the wanton pose, but he hushed her and spread one big hand between her hip bones to keep her in place.
The heavy heat of it made her inner muscles clench and she turned her head to instinctively seek his kiss once more. His mouth found hers and they were at it again, their tongues twining, then seeking. He drove deep and she sucked on his, making him shudder.
His free hand roamed her neck, her throat, her collarbone and then skimmed over one breast. She quivered, and he came back to it, with a light touch pressing her tight nipple into the cup of his palm. His fingers closed over the rounded flesh and it swelled, the ache causing her to moan, a sound he swallowed down his throat.
He found the little buttons marching down her bodice and managed to undo them, their mouths still fused. Pushing aside the fabric, he shoved his hand beneath the stretchy lace of the cup of her bra and his big body went taut as he covered her bare flesh.
Lilly arched into his touch, wanting more. His mouth trailed across her cheek to her ear. He tongued the lobe, and goose bumps spread from the tiny point of contact to the top of her scalp and to the bottom of her toes.
“Alec,” she said, her voice fractured. He wasn’t moving his hands, they only contained her, one around her breast, the other anchoring her hips in place. She wiggled her bottom and his fingers moved, tightening on her nipple. The little pain was glorious and she wiggled again. He increased the pressure and she moaned, her mouth seeking any of his skin. It found his throat and she wet it with her tongue, tasting the clean citrus flavor of him, barely salted.
He moved his hand to her other breast and she arched again as his lips dragged back to hers. Their breathing sounded loud within their velvet enclosure and Lilly wanted to do something with her hands. She wanted to feel him, touch him, please him.
Reaching behind her, she looped her hands around his neck. Her nails dragged against his scalp and his breath caught as he broke the kiss. “Stay like that, Lilly,” he said, his voice strained, the timbre rough. “Just like that, sugar.”
Then he proceeded to drive her mad.
He teased her nipples, plucking and twisting at them until she was rocking in his lap, her range of motion limited by the heavy weight of his other hand. She whimpered and he pressed his cheek to her temple. “What do you need, sugar?”
As if she could say it out loud. Then she didn’t need to, because he used that hand to grasp at the skirt of her dress, yanking it above her panties. Then his fingers slid under elastic and silky fabric to cup her mons. Her craving for his touch doubled and she lifted into this new one. With a minute adjustment, one long finger slid into the groove between her lower lips and he pressed there, even as she felt the gush of her body’s arousal wet his hand.
Embarrassed, she turned her face into his throat and he pressed a kiss to her hair. “Don’t be shy, Lilly. This is what you want. This is what we both have been wanting.”
As if she could deny it, given her shaking thighs and the heated response of her private flesh. But she squeezed her eyes shut all the same, sealing the image of his big hand caressing her.
He teased her layers open with deft touches, moving his fingertips in circles to spread her liquid all over the soft, sensitized flesh. Cool air touched her there and again her inner muscles clenched and released, leaving behind a frustrating emptiness.
She made to move her arms, intending to goad him into something, into more, but he pinched her nipple and made her gasp in a stab of mixed pleasure and pain. “Keep them overhead, sugar,” he commanded. “Right where they are.”
With a muffled sound of agonized frustration, she returned to position. He chuckled, the sound sexy and male. “Here you go,” he said, and slid one long finger inside her, a slow, deliberate possession.
Her eyes half-opened at the absolute sensual thrill of it. “Oh, God,” she whispered, tightening on the intrusion. Her heartbeat thundered in her ears as he began moving it in and out, in a rhythm that turned her mad then madder as he added a second finger. The stretch was delicious and she arched, holding him inside her.
He murmured against her temple, phrases and words that barely registered. So hot…so wet…that’s right, sugar, let me add another.
The
third finger made her cry out but he shushed her again. You can take this, baby…I know, God, your tight pussy is incredible.
Another time she might have blushed at the blatant carnality, but she was too far gone now, panting with a need she’d never known before as she rocked her hips into the pleasure and burned with the sweetest of scalding fevers.
“Alec,” she pleaded, unable to say more than his name.
He drew out his fingers, drove them inside her again and she arched, goose bumps springing up everywhere and her toes curling. “Alec…please.”
“I can’t wait to get inside this soaked pussy,” he said, his voice rough with promise. “But first I’m gonna send you flying.” Then he touched his thumb to her clit, thrumming across the swollen, pulsing nub.
Lilly’s pleasure shot high then shattered, and she buried her head against his shoulder, her teeth closing over cotton-covered muscle as she rode out the waves of ecstatic release.
Incredible.
Only with the final twitch of her muscles did she remember the awkwardness of this kind of one-sided encounter. With a new flush of embarrassment, she freed the fabric in her mouth, hyper-aware of Alec’s hand still buried between her thighs. They both breathed unsteadily.
“Um…” What could she possibly say? “Your turn?”
“Sugar, I want nothing more than to lie you down, get you naked, and learn everything there is to know about you with my tongue—” He broke off, laughing softly. “Sweet girl, that just made you wet all over again.”
His hand slipped carefully from her body and at her small gasp he soothed her with a soft kiss to her hot cheek. “But we can’t do that here. There’s broken glass everywhere and it’s not exactly private.”
Chagrined, Lilly righted her clothes and quickly clambered to her feet, ignoring her wobbly knees as she fastened her dress’s buttons. “I…” In his arms she’d felt safe and not for a second had she considered someone might stumble upon them. “I’m sorry.” Her face continued to burn.
Our Last First Kiss KOBO Page 9