It was kind of adorable.
“Jeez, re-lax. We’re fine. We’ve done way worse stuff than this.”
“We have not had sex in a stranger’s car before.”
“Only in a stranger’s house.” She started pulling on her bottoms, though judging by his frantic waving, her pace was too leisurely for his liking.
“When?” He reached for her bikini top, tossed it toward her, and she began tying the sides. Then he helped her into her coat.
“The open house where we pretended to be Russian emigrants.”
“Nobody really owned that house. At least, not then.”
Avery scoffed. “Whatever. You worry too much.” She scooted out of the car and slammed the door behind her.
She didn’t bother putting her high heels back on as she traipsed through the parking lot. After a short distance, she stopped in front of her faded blue pickup truck and tossed the shoes into the back.
“What, do you want to christen every car in the parking lot?” he asked.
She noted the hopeful tone in his voice.
“This is my new car.”
“Since when do you have a new car?”
“My Civic died a few months ago, didn’t think it was worth mentioning. We can definitely give it a go in this one later if you want, though.” She stepped onto the metal step and propelled herself into the driver’s seat. When he’d settled in and closed his own door, she continued, “Bench seats. Made for love on the run.”
“I will strongly consider that,” he said.
There was something in his tone that made the words an inviting sort of threat. An intimate dare. Too intimate.
She glanced toward his hand, inches from her own, and adjusted her grip on the steering wheel.
“Okay. Now that everybody is feeling refreshed, how are things? How’s leave going?” She backed out of the parking space, heading for the open road.
“Fine. I’ll be excited to get back in the line of duty, though.”
Panic seeped into her every time she so much as considered it, but she couldn’t bring herself to dwell on it. So, she got her mind off of their fates the only way she knew how.
“You know, I imagine the blow-up sex dolls are a lot classier when you’re out in the field. They give you those, right? Like, for company?” Stupid jokes.
“What?” He smirked, turning up the corner of his mouth.
Panic was still edging in, so she continued, “You know, like they did in World War II. Don’t they still pass those out? All I’m saying is that face”—she made her eyes wide and formed a large O with her mouth—“could be a real comfort to you.”
“How do you even know about all this stuff?”
She raised her eyebrows at him before turning her attention back to the road. “I’ve been a photographer for a few years now. When you freelance, you see a lot of weird stuff.”
There was a momentary lull before Holden spoke again.
“So, do you still live in the same place, or are you going to park in front of your old complex and see if we can get into the pool before you tell me that it’s now a nuclear waste dumping site?”
“Cute. No, I live in the same place. It just blows now that Myla isn’t in the same complex.” She shrugged. “At least she’s happy with Stone Blanchett or whatever they call him on that soap opera of his.”
“Yeah. It’s weird seeing her on magazines when I go into town. Of all the people to wind up on the news, my money had always been on you.” He treated her to a mischievous grin, and she had half a mind to pull over on the spot and have her wicked way with him. Still, there was something penetrating in his gaze that gave her pause. A knowingness that unsettled her.
“Me? On the news? For what, a Miss America pageant?”
“Arson conviction. Grand theft auto. I had a few theories.”
“That’s for amateurs. I’m like a fine bottle of stolen wine when it comes to law breaking.” She waved him off with a sigh of relief. Back to jokes and insults. This was the way things were supposed to be between them. The way they always had been.
He snorted.
She exhaled before parking in front of her familiar, run-down brick building. “If I wanted judgment, I’d have stayed with Myla.”
In the space it took her to unbuckle and open the door, Holden had already joined her. Apparently stealthy moving was no joke in the Marines. She was about to say as much but was interrupted as he pressed the entire length of his body flush with hers, holding her wrists against the door in a strong, sexy grip. All of his muscles bore down on her, spreading warmth through every fiber of her being.
God, he felt good…
“I think my presence has some added benefits that Myla can’t offer.” The panic, so familiar when he was around, ratcheted up a few more notches.
She broke away and ducked under his arm like an old pro.
Too close.
She had to create some kind of space. Room to breathe. If she didn’t, she might lose her head. And her resolve. And become emotionally involved. “Normally, you’d be right. Unless she’s drunk. Speaking of which, I have a story to tell you.” She winked, trying to distract him from her shaking breath.
Damned if this one week in paradise wasn’t going to be a hell of a lot harder than any she’d shared with Holden before. And she wasn’t exactly sure why.
Chapter Four
“Rodrigo, here kitty, kitty,” Avery called as she opened the apartment door and strutted inside. Holden followed her, his bag slung over one shoulder as he took in her place. In a sense, it wasn’t all that different from the last time he’d visited. That was to say, it was a total wreck.
Not in a gross way. There were no animal carcasses or hoarder’s specials in her future, but a cleaning lady might not have been a horrible investment. Or furniture that wasn’t from a thrift store’s “free to a good home” pile. In fact, the only thing even remotely appealing about the place—aside from Avery herself—were the photos pinned to the otherwise empty walls.
Holden walked past the entertainment center—a nineties-style television sitting on a few concrete blocks—and Rodrigo slinked out to greet him, purring before rolling over to show Holden his tummy.
“You’re working on a new collection,” he said, pointing to the row of photos, all featuring elderly women’s hands, above the television.
“Yeah. The ladies at the senior center feel like celebrities. And now I have enough Jell-O cups to last me a lifetime, so it’s a pretty fair trade-off.” Avery shrugged.
“They’re beautiful. You should send them to a gallery.”
She turned, eying him skeptically. “Are you actually complimenting something in my apartment?”
“No, I’m admiring your work. Your apartment still looks like the cut scenes from a VH1 Behind the Music on Janis Joplin.” He smiled, tossed his bag into the corner behind the door, and then bent down to pet Rodrigo. Avery took his momentary distraction as an opportunity to flounce out of the room, barely glancing at the empty tequila bottle or mess of poker chips strewn across her coffee table as she went.
“You’re cute if you think I know who that is,” she said.
He settled on the couch, disappointed when her bedroom door closed, shutting out his view of the barely there, red-and-white-striped bikini bottom. It felt like forever since he’d been here. Alone with her, smelling the orange and coconut fragrance of her hair as he held her close. Thinking about her torturously long legs and the rest of that graceful, pliable body, he had half a mind to break down her bedroom door and not release her until morning. Or ever.
But those days are over.
After years of waffling, he’d made up his mind. By the end of their week together, he was going to make Avery the kind of woman who was suited to military life. She didn’t have to be Mary Poppins. She didn’t have to be June Cleaver. Hell, she didn’t have to keep a house or cook or anything if she didn’t want to.
She just had to agree to wait for him.
“Hello? Anybody home?” He glanced up to find her leaning against the white doorframe into her bedroom, waving her hand in the air. How long had she been standing there?
There was no way of knowing, nor could he understand how she hadn’t immediately grabbed his attention when she’d entered the room. She looked incredible.
Her feet were encased in knee-high boots while skintight leggings clung to her thighs, almost see-through in the apartment’s fluorescent lights. The V-neck tee that plunged low over her chest revealed just a little too much cleavage.
Hot. Damn.
“You look beautiful.” The words slipped out almost instantly, and if he didn’t know any better, he might have thought she blushed. Just as quickly, though, the moment was gone, and she cleared her throat as she pushed a lock of platinum hair over her shoulder.
“I think the word is hot,” she corrected.
“No, I don’t think it is.” He smiled at her, and she let out something between a cough and a sigh before gathering up her bag from the plastic dining room table and scrambling for the door.
“Well, thanks. Anyway, we gotta run or—”
“I just got off the plane. I don’t intend on running anywhere.” He stretched his feet out onto her coffee table, only slightly nervous about whether the rickety thing could hold his weight.
“Well, we’re not just going to sit around here,” she said.
“I didn’t think we’d do that, either.” He raised his eyebrows, trying not to grin at how cute she looked when she was flustered.
He got up from the sofa and made his way into her bedroom. This room, too, was just as much Avery as the rest of the place. Makeup littered the top of her shoddily painted white dresser, but glass pulls made the thing into a piece of art. On her bed was the same lavender silk comforter she’d had since the first time she’d let him into her bed, one night after they’d snuck into the woods and lied to their parents about where they were staying.
He’d told himself it was a white lie at the time. It was, after all, the only way they’d let him out of the house. If they’d even caught a whiff of Avery and her mother’s old trailer, his bedroom would have been locked until he’d graduated high school. As for Avery, she’d only lied so that he wouldn’t feel alone. She knew her mother didn’t care where she went, or with who. She had bigger concerns. But Avery kept up the facade all the same.
Sometimes he wasn’t sure who she’d kept it up for—her mother or herself.
Either way, their parents and their friends were the last thing on his mind the first time he’d seen the frilly purple down blanket that was so unlike Avery. It was delicate and silky, sure, but it was feminine in a way that Avery would never dare to be. There was nothing tough about it. But when she’d taken her clothes off and lain on top of it, somehow it had seemed right. It had seemed perfect for her.
He took a step toward the cover, taking the fabric between two fingers and feeling the slide of the silk, when Avery’s voice brought him back to the present.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“I was just thinking,” he said.
“About what? You’ve got a weird look on your face.”
“The first time…” He glanced over his shoulder at her. “The first time we were together.”
“Oh.” She swallowed.
“You remember?” he asked, more because he couldn’t think of what else to say. He knew she would remember, knew it was a night she probably thought about just as often as he did.
“Of course I do.” Her words were quiet. Then, louder, she said, “Come on, there’s no time for a trip down memory lane”
“There was something I never understood about that night.”
She bit her bottom lip, but didn’t say anything.
He pressed on. “Why did you…Why didn’t you tell me it was your first time?”
“I didn’t see why it mattered.” Her answer came a little too fast.
“It mattered to me,” Holden said
“Why should it?”
“It just did,” he said, and again he thought of the way she’d looked that night, sliding the silky blue dress over her head and letting him see her pretty white panties and matching bra. Then those had fallen away, too, and she was there, in front of him. Both of them had only been eighteen, knowing nothing at all, yet still dying to take the world by storm.
He’d asked her that night why she’d slept with him. It had nearly killed him. He’d stood there, staring at her, so naked and ready, but he’d had to know. Had to make sure it was right.
“You can’t leave without…” she’d said. “You can’t leave without taking a part of me with you.”
He’d been set for his first deployment just after graduation, which left them only two more months together to sneak around, get drunk in the woods, and make bad choices. Or, as it happened, very, very good ones.
“Holden,” Avery’s voice brought him back to the present, and for an instant, he caught a glimpse of the girl from that night so long ago. Scared, but trying her damnedest not to show it. So, he stalked toward her and wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her close against him until she could feel his hard need.
“Holden,” she breathed again, but this time it was clear that he’d caught her off guard. And that she liked it.
“Come to bed.” He whispered against her ear. “Come to bed with me.”
“I…” She bit her bottom lip, and it was all he could do not to swoop down and kiss the little red space there. “We should get going. We just—”
“I don’t care what we just did. Do you know how long I’ve been away from you?”
“Of course—”
“Once isn’t enough.” He tugged her shirt over her head, mussing her hair. He had half a mind to leave the boots on, but that would be for another time. He’d already been with kinky Avery. Now he wanted the real Avery. The Avery that had given him a piece of herself to carry with him.
“Get on the bed,” he said.
She eyed him for a moment then sat on the edge of the mattress, her long legs crossed in front of her.
Slowly, he knelt in front of her and pried her thighs apart. Taking an ankle in one hand, he pulled down the zipper of one boot, then tugged it off before doing the same with the other. Next, he pulled away her socks, and he was on the verge of pulling down her leggings with his teeth when she said his name again.
“Holden, don’t you think—?”
He cut her off. “I’m not thinking right now, and neither are you.” He hooked his thumbs over the elastic of her waistband, and she gave him a questioning look before leaning back on her elbows and allowing him to pull the leggings away.
Underneath she wore a pair of coral panties, lacy and see-through, flirty in a way that screamed Avery. Another surge of need rushed to his shaft as he took in the little damp spot between her legs.
“Take your shirt off,” he commanded, needing to see if her bra matched her tiny scrap of lace. Then, just as strongly, needing to pull it away and see the swell of her beautiful breasts.
She did as he asked, and her stiff, dusky nipples greeted him beneath the sheer fabric of her matching bra.
“God, you’re beautiful.”
“Hot,” she corrected him again, but he shook his head.
“No, beautiful.” He braced his hands on either side of her hips and leaned forward, nudging the fabric of her bra aside to take one of her nipples in his mouth. “Gorgeous,” he murmured, then moved to take the other as she unclasped her bra and her breasts were free for him to explore.
He took each of them in hand, massaging them lightly as he surveyed her body and marveled again at exactly how lucky he was to be with someone like her. He needed to show her, needed her to feel it without him saying a word.
So, he kissed his way down the plane of her stomach until he reached the hem of her panties.
“Perfect,” he murmured. Then he pushed the scrap of lace aside and teased her with his thumb, runni
ng the pad of his digit up and down her slick folds over and over until he found her tight bud and swirled it gently, casually, until she quaked and trembled. And all the while, he watched her, taking in the hollow of her throat, the way her breath caught when he found her clit, the way her thighs tensed and relaxed with every stroke.
“Why are you staring at me?” she asked, her breath catching as he teased her sensitive bud again.
“I want to watch you,” he murmured. “I like the way your eyelashes flutter when I do this.” He pushed a finger inside her waiting heat, and her thighs quaked. “I like the way your breasts bounce when I move in and out of you.” He pistoned his fingers to show what he meant, and she let out a slow hiss of approval.
Gingerly, he leaned forward and kissed the space between her legs, swirling his tongue until her trembling became writhing, and she rocked her hips against him with every move of his fingers, almost as if she couldn’t help herself. Like she needed him.
He kissed her deeper, lapping her core until they found a rhythm. She rocked harder and harder against him with every thrust, needing him more with every movement. She was close, he knew, and he had half a mind to thrust inside her and feel her break apart around his hardness. He wanted—no, needed—to feel her lose control in his arms. Needed her to need him that way.
But that could wait, too.
Right now, he would watch her. Watch as her mouth rounded into a tiny O and she split apart, shaking with pleasure as he made her come undone, made her show that she wanted him every bit as much as he wanted and needed her.
“Yes, Avery,” he growled between licks. “Yes, baby. Come for me.”
“Holden,” she said, but the final syllable broke off and she gasped again, gripping the covers beneath her.
“Come on, baby,” he encouraged. And then her walls tensed, and he worked his fingers with greedy desperation, allowing her need to take hold as he pushed her over the edge. Her cheeks turned a bright red that spread all the way down to her chest.
“I…” But whatever she’d wanted to say was washed away in a deep, needy moan as the final waves of her pleasure took hold.
One Week with the Marine (Love on Location) Page 3