Rescuing the Bad Boy

by Jessica Lemmon

  Old habits died hard.

  Once there, he wrapped his hand around his shaft. He squeezed, giving himself one slow, sudsy stroke… then another.

  Thoughts of Sofie filled his mind. Her parted lips, sensual sighs, the way she’d made s’mores sound sexy in the wrongest way…

  He blew out a breath and flattened both palms on the back wall of the shower. When he bent his head into the stream, he took in several deep breaths through his mouth. Hot water streamed down his face, flooded over his eyes, and soaked his hair.

  Suck it up, Pate.

  But that thought introduced new imagery into his head—a head already filled with images of Sofie. Memories of her bare nipple tightening on his tongue, the way she moved like silk beneath his hands, sinking into her warm, wet puss—

  A sharp knock on the bathroom made him jerk.

  He pulled his face from the water. “Yeah,” he called, wiping his eyes and pushing his hair back. “Hang on.”

  One last rinse, and he turned off the shower. He stepped out, running the towel over his hair quickly, over his body just as quickly, before wrapping it around his waist. He pulled open the door, the lust he was feeling a second earlier evaporating into the atmosphere.

  “Connor,” he said flatly.

  His buddy gave him a knowing grin. “Sorry to disappoint you.”

  Donovan pushed past him and stepped into the master bedroom, digging in his dresser for fresh clothes. He’d given up the suitcases earlier this week. Seemed ridiculous to continue digging through bags when he wasn’t going anywhere for a while. He pushed the drawer shut. “Get it straightened out?”

  “Ant doesn’t want paid,” Connor said.

  Ant had come by to help remove some of the brush and dead tree limbs for the campout the night before the charity dinner. Connor was only one guy, and clearing a big enough space for that many kids required more manpower than just him and Donovan.

  “Yeah, well, I’m paying you both.” Donovan stuffed his legs into jeans and pulled them up, tossing the towel on the floor after his ass was covered.

  He hadn’t gotten a bed for this bedroom yet, but he did find a blowup mattress. It was not comfortable, but ten times better than sleeping on the springy red sofa in the library downstairs.

  “I appreciate you guys wanting to donate your time but I have money set aside to handle the house. No sense in being noble to a fault.”

  “You know I would do it for free.”

  Donovan slapped his friend’s shoulder. “I know you would. I’m not asking you to.” He reached for the T-shirt next and pulled it on.

  “Fine,” Connor said. “I’ll donate what you give me to Open Arms. Those kids deserve better than their shithole parents.”

  On that, they agreed. “Planning on making a sizable donation myself.”

  Connor nodded, his lips pressed into a thin line. “My father called. Cabinet installation in Somerset.”

  Somerset was a neighboring town, not far from Evergreen Cove. But Donovan knew the short drive wasn’t why Connor was upset. He was upset because his father had a way of mixing guilt and obligation like a cocktail and serving it straight up Connor’s ass.

  “Hate to leave you high and dry.” Connor’s mouth pulled into a deeper frown.

  “Do what you gotta do, man. You know the timeline.”

  Hell, he knew Connor wouldn’t leave him high and dry. He was loyal. That loyalty likely the reason why Connor insisted on helping him. Without him, Donovan would be more behind on getting the house ready. And he’d already been stuck here long enough.

  Sofie’s face flashed in his mind. If he hadn’t been stuck here, he would have missed out on yesterday. On this morning. On seeing her again, period. He pushed the thought away.

  He had a job to do, and when it was done, he was gone. He may have agreed to do extra, to see the preparation for the charity dinner through, but after, he was going back to New York.

  Distracting brunette or not.

  Donovan had returned to the great room to work on the fireplace after he and Ant finished in the backyard. He’d heard Sofie on her cell phone earlier, her voice filtering into the hallway. Just as well she was working, he could use an excuse for a diversion himself. Thanks to a fresh heap of sexual frustration.

  Easier to forget he had primal urges after having denied himself for so long. Now on the surface, they were proving harder and harder to ignore.

  No pun intended.

  On the bright side, the fireplace was coming along. The rocks he’d excavated at the quarry, and a few Evan had found, fit nicely into the design. So far Donovan had managed to reface the entire right side. Progress.

  “Looks good.”

  Sofie strode into the room and his breath caught in his chest. It had been a long while since anyone hitched his breath. Since anyone had taken him by surprise at all.

  Just her. Just yesterday. When she let him kiss her, and then pulled her shirt off over her head in an invitation he hadn’t been able to refuse.

  Do me?

  There went the twitch coming from his pants again. He’d forgotten how much it was like having an untrained stallion running free in there. Horse out of the barn, it wouldn’t stay still.

  Whoa, fella.

  He pushed to standing and faced her, subtly adjusting himself as he did. “Gives me something to do.”

  Besides picture you naked and under me.

  “I’m done”—she pointed over her shoulder to the direction of the ballroom—“making the floor plan in there.” She pushed her hair off her face and wound it behind her ear in a nervous gesture. He liked that. A lot. He hadn’t been out of the game long enough to forget that when a woman touched her hair around a guy, it meant she liked him. Good news for him.

  And Shadowfax, down there.

  “I wanted to come in and…” She waved a hand in an uncomfortable gesture. Then she blew out a breath, her shoulders sagging. “Okay, I’m not going to lie about why I came in here.” She looked everywhere in the room but at him.

  “I’ll bite.” He let the offer hang.

  She didn’t miss his attempt at a cheesy joke. Tilting her head to one side, her mouth pulled into an expression more indecision than humor.

  “I came in here to talk about what happened… on the washer.” She winced, clearly uncomfortable bringing it up.

  Should’ve seen this coming. The big talk about how she didn’t want to keep doing what he knew damn well they both wanted to do. He’d let her have this discussion. Frankly, he owed her that. Talking her into sex wasn’t on his agenda this time around.

  Ever again.

  Didn’t mean he wouldn’t get in as many preemptive strikes as possible. “Did you sleep well?”

  That threw her. She blinked a few times as he ambled over to her.

  “Did I… y-yes. I did sleep well.”

  In front of her now, he touched her face, knowing it would unevenly stack the deck in his favor. He tipped her chin and rested his other hand on to her hip. “Me too. On a shitty air mattress. In a house I hate. Have you to thank.”

  Her brows bowed in sympathy. His Scampi. So fucking sweet.

  He let go of her, scrubbing his face before pulling both hands through his hair. He pushed it off his face, but it fell over his forehead anyway. “Hell, I can’t do this.”

  He hated himself for saying it, but later he wouldn’t. Because giving her an out was the right thing to do.

  Maybe.

  “Do what?” Her voice was a barely discernible whisper.

  He backed up a few steps and collapsed into a big, gold chair, unearthing a few months’ worth of dust mites in the process. He rubbed his nose when he spoke. “Scampi, you wanna walk away, and I am not going to argue. I don’t want that, but I deserve that. More than that. Hell, I know—”

  “No.”

  He lifted his head, elbows perched on his knees, words he hadn’t wanted to say still sitting on his tongue. She stood over him, reversing their roles, forcing him
to lift his chin to look up at her. All that flowing mahogany hair, T-shirt hugging her body, the womanly flare of her hips leading down to an ass he wanted to take a bite out of… God. Gorgeous.

  “I don’t want to walk away.” She stepped closer and parted his knees, wedging her legs between them, lining up his face with her stomach.

  “No?”

  “No,” she whispered.

  Testing her claim, he lifted his hands, watching in wonder when she didn’t smack him away. She let him grab her hips and tug her toward him. Willingly, her muscles loose and accommodating. He didn’t feel the tiniest bit of resistance. He liked that she wanted him to touch her. It was one thing for him to trust himself, a whole other for her to trust him.

  Her fingers fed into his hair, no longer damp from his shower. “How long are you staying?”

  “ ’Til I get done.” Not the most forthright answer, but it was the truth. He didn’t specify what he’d have to get done doing, leaving himself an escape hatch.

  More old habits.

  “Okay.” She didn’t flinch, didn’t ask him to clarify, which bothered him.

  He didn’t like that it bothered him.

  Her hands moved from his hair to his hands, still at home on her hips. “I figure while you’re here, we could… satisfy our curiosity.”

  He swallowed around a lump in his throat, her offer humbling him. “You sure about that? I’m pretty curious.”

  Clutching his hands into fists at the waistband of her pants, he tugged her closer. She had to lean forward and put her palms on his shoulders to keep from falling into him. The tips of her hair tickled his face, turned up at a severe angle since she was leaning over him.

  “I’m happy to satisfy your curiosity,” she said down to him, a sexy lilt in her voice. “And after the charity dinner, I’ll be done. That will be the end of assignments from Gertrude. That will be the end of my needing the mansion.”

  The end of them.

  Her fingers brushed the hair out of his eyes. “Straight through, right?” The honesty in her green eyes flayed him.

  But he didn’t argue. “That’s my motto.”

  Her lips came down to meet his in a soft, slow, wet, light-his-pants-on-fire kiss. His eyes sank closed. God. Her taste. So sweet. It’d been twenty-four long hours since he’d had her tongue in his mouth. After seven years had nearly driven him out of his mind.

  He threaded his hand into her hair, the fingers of his other hand cupping her ass and pulling her into his lap.

  She straddled him, one knee on each side of his thighs, settling over him. He moved his hand from her hair and put both hands on her butt, holding her tightly against him and grinding against her through his pants and hers.

  “Too many clothes,” he said around another kiss.

  “Is anyone here?” she asked.

  “Don’t care.”

  “Connor—”

  “Gone.” Maybe. Who cared? Another kiss, with tongue.

  “Ant?”

  “Gone.”

  He pushed a palm under the hem of her T-shirt. Her skin was baby soft, her ribs expanding with the next breath she drew.

  “Do me,” he murmured into her mouth, his tongue sliding along the length of hers and causing his hips to buck.

  She smiled, and when she did, his lips glanced off her teeth, which was sexy in the weirdest way. Everything about her was sexy. Everything about her made him think of sex, sex with her, and where he wanted to have sex with her.

  Her tone was cute, playful when she said, “You’re making fun of me.”

  He kissed her bottom lip and tugged it gently with his teeth, capping it with a soft kiss. “I would never,” he lied.

  Lifting the material, he exposed her flat stomach, adorable belly button, and bra. White with tiny blue flowers on it.

  “I used to be a lace man, Scampi, but you make cotton sexy.”

  A sultry laugh tumbled from her lips. He felt it under his palms, both of which he’d wrapped around her ribs in an attempt to get her upper half undressed. “Like I told you yesterday, I already said yes. There’s no need for flattery.”

  Thumbs brushed over the bra and she gasped. “How about I flatter you because I want to.”

  And he did want to. It’d been a long time since he’d allowed himself to say anything suggestive to a woman. Sofie struck him as a woman who didn’t hear it often enough. Crying shame, that.

  While they were together, he wasn’t holding back on the compliments.

  He tugged her shirt off and watched as her wavy brown hair fell over her shoulders. The bra went next. “Front clasp. I approve.”

  He freed her gorgeous breasts, peach with pink tips—reminding him of the fancy desserts served at the snooty parties in the Hamptons. Raspberries on sorbet. He wasted no time taking a taste. Suckling one while he thumbed the other. She arched against him, riding his hard-on and making him grunt.

  Self-control has left the building.

  Reluctantly, but before he went too far and couldn’t think at all, he pulled his mouth off her delectable body and cursed under his breath.

  “What’s wrong?” Her eyes were wide, her palms resting on his shoulders, those perfectly delicious breasts in his face. Nothing. Absolutely nothing was wrong with half-naked Scampi straddling his johnson.

  Unless they wanted to go further.

  “Sweetheart.” He shook his head and tore his eyes away from her chest to look into her eyes. “No condoms.”

  The way her shoulders sank told him she hadn’t planned ahead, either. “I didn’t decide about us until I saw you outside earlier.” Looking slightly guilty, she added, “You’re sexy when you’re sweaty.”

  He dropped his forehead between her breasts and let out a dry chuckle. Her fingertips slipped into the back of his hair, her touch making him tingle from scalp to balls. It was the best feeling of his life. Cruel because he couldn’t act on it, but awesome all the same.

  “Ironically,” he said, “I’m relieved you don’t have a huge stash of rubbers to pull from.”

  “Excuse me.” She gave his hair a sharp yank and drew his face back so he was looking up at her. “I believe of the two of us, you are the one who has round-the-clock care for your privates.”

  He felt his lips curve. He liked her feisty. Cupping her ass with both hands, he stood, lifting her as he did. A narrow table stood behind the sofa in front of the fireplace he’d been repairing. He carried her there while she held on to his shoulders, plopping her down on the surface.

  “You flatter me with how much you think I get laid,” he told her.

  If she only knew.

  She peeled his T-shirt over his chest, which was as high as her arms went. He helped her, taking his shirt the rest of the way off. When his chest was bared, her lips landed on his ribs, her tongue darting out and wetting his skin.

  His hand went to her hair as her mouth moved on his body. He forced a breath between his teeth.

  “We can do other condom-less things,” she suggested, sucking his skin as her lips moved across his chest. Her fingers dipped into the waistband of his jeans, her tongue mimicking the motion she had in mind. His hips thrust forward involuntarily.

  It took a dose of superhuman strength, but he managed to reroute her lips to his.

  “Nope, that’s not on the docket, babe.” He kissed her lips, her throat, and down to her bare chest. Her bra, open, still hung on her shoulders. He tossed it aside.

  “Why not?”

  Because I’ll come like a freight train and pass out instantly.

  “Because I said so.”

  “I need to know…” She sighed as he pulled a nipple into his mouth again. “For safety reasons…” Her breath stuttered from her lips; losing control already. “How many since me?”

  He pushed his hand between her legs, parting her pants-covered thighs. She grasped his face, he thought to guide him, until she yanked his head up, robbing him of the breast he was happily working.

  “Donny,” she
said, her face serious.

  Too serious.

  Resting his hand on her thigh, he watched her gorgeous mouth form two words, and that’s when he knew he was screwed.

  And not in the fun way.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Ballpark me.”

  He felt his eyelids narrow as he took her in. She was asking this… why?

  “Important all of a sudden,” he grumbled.

  Her lips went tight.

  He guessed she was asking because there were no condoms, and she wanted to play without one. That thought made him hard in an instant—could split a tree with the erection raging in his pants—but the risk was too great to get her pregnant.

  “I’m on the pill.”

  Correction: now he could split a tree with the erection in his pants.

  “And I can promise you, uh…” Her gaze skittered around the room before she met his eyes. “I’m clean. Are you?”

  In that manner? Squeaky.

  “I’d trust you if you said you were,” she said. “You wouldn’t lie to me about that, right?”

  He wouldn’t lie.

  “I was also curious… wondering who I’ve been measuring up to since then.” She shrugged, her luscious breasts rising and falling with the movement. “That’s fair, right?”

  “Clean, Scampi.” He stroked her ribs with his thumbs, wanting to kiss her again and abandon this conversation entirely. “Could eat off me.”

  Her cheeks colored and a small smile found her face. But she wasn’t done yet.

  “I’ve had four lovers since you, bringing my grand total to five.” She held up her hand in front of his face and wiggled her fingers. “Lame, I know. But that’s the truth.”

  Silence ate into the conversation. Her brows lifted as she waited.

  He sighed, straightened some. “Zero or one hundred, Scampi, what’s it matter?”

  “A hundred?” She would latch on to that number. Zero was too unbelievable. Hell, it was true and he didn’t believe it.

  He laughed, but it wasn’t funny. “No, sweetheart. Not a hundred.”

  Not a hundred.

  Zero was impossible. One hundred was improbable. She hoped.