Rescuing the Bad Boy

by Jessica Lemmon

  “You know it, sweetcheeks.” He threw an arm around Heather’s neck and pulled her close.

  Sofie’s stomach flopped, filled with gut-wrenching envy. Sick. She was going to be sick.

  He dragged Heather to his Jeep and called over his shoulder, “Later, Scampi.”

  Sofie snapped back to the present, brought back by the feel of Donny’s rough palm on her jaw. She blinked up at him, the man in her memory feathering at the edges and evaporating into the air. Years, knowledge, and seasons separated him from the man he used to be. He wasn’t the same. Neither was she.

  She traced the tattoo on his left side. An infinity symbol the same as hers, but it was a universal symbol. Could be a coincidence. Probably was a coincidence.

  “I got it a few years back,” he told her. “Ev came out to visit, did the quote on my ribs. I had this one added at the same time.”

  She hadn’t taken her eyes off the symbol yet. Didn’t want to see his face, or embarrass herself by blurting out she’d thought for a moment his tattoo matched hers.

  “Endless possibility,” he said.

  “What?” Her head snapped up, her eyes finding his.

  “That’s why you chose an infinity symbol. You said it represented ‘endless possibility.’ ”

  She had said that. She’d been twenty-one and so full of hope. Before she knew bad things happened to nice girls… that bad boys happened to nice girls.

  “I never showed it to you,” she muttered, almost to herself.

  “Not intentionally.” His fingertip rubbed the tiny tattoo on the side of her left breast. “I saw it the night in the library…” he trailed off but he didn’t have to say more.

  He’d had her naked that night. Mostly.

  “And you… got your own?” She refused to ask the question she’d been wondering since she laid eyes on it: Why?

  “Remember when I said my tats cover scars?”

  “Oh my gosh.” He couldn’t mean…

  There, under the spraying water, pressed against him, his fingers left her body and dug into her wet hair. He lowered his lips to hers and in a soft voice confirmed her fear.

  “You are one of my scars, Sofie.”

  It was the truth. But not in the way she was thinking.

  “The tree.” He took his hand out of her hair to show her the gnarled branches crawling up his forearm. “That one was bad.”

  Her fingers slid through the water running down the scar hidden in the trunk of the tree. Delicately. Sweetly. Trying to make him hurt less, he knew.

  “Few years back, I was building this outdoor fireplace at this massive, massive mansion on the beach in the Hamptons. Twelve feet up on a ladder, I’m hauling this big-ass rock, my arm shaking, my shoulders burning.”

  Stupid. It was completely stupid. He should’ve had a spotter, much like Sofie should’ve had a spotter at the bottom of the ladder in the dining room the day she was painting.

  “There was nothing but concrete to catch my fall,” he continued. “The stone was the perfect shape for the center of the fireplace. I searched everywhere and finally found the rock—right size, color, the right everything. It started to slip, and I did what I could to keep from dropping it and busting it to pieces.”

  Sofie’s eyebrows bent into a look of concern. This girl. She felt so damn much. Her thumb stroked back and forth over his skin. He wondered if she knew she was doing it; if she knew how much he liked her hands on him.

  “You could’ve broken your neck,” she said.

  “Didn’t.” He’d held on to the finished section of the fireplace for dear life, until his muscles shook from exertion. Until he was able to both right himself on the ladder and salvage the stone.

  “Got the fucker on there,” he said with pride.

  She smiled up at him, in an expression that looked proud as well. She shook her head. “And cut yourself, I’m guessing?”

  “Tons of stitches.”

  Her eyes went to his arm again.

  “Poured my heart into that piece.” After a silent moment, he asked, “Get it, Scampi?”

  The dent between her eyebrows answered his question. She did not get it. He was going to have to spell it out. And for a guy who wasn’t used to admitting his feelings, or that he had them, he wondered for a second what he’d gotten himself into.

  Sofie. Sofie was what you’ve gotten yourself into.

  Like she was embedded under his skin, infecting him and making him feel the things he’d spent years teaching himself not to feel.

  He touched his hand to her infinity tattoo again. “Not all scars are bad memories.”

  She locked her arms around his neck and tugged his face down to meet hers. Then her lips were on his, slanting over his mouth and kissing him deeply while he sought purchase on her hips. Her tongue plundered, tangled with his as rivulets of water ran into his ears, down his throat, and dripped from his lips to hers. She tasted minty from toothpaste, and like Sofie—like hope, and care, and every part of her was turning him on.

  He didn’t think, only reacted. Reacted to the way she pressed her body against his, the way all her soft, warm flesh felt under his kneading palms. She freed one hand and reached for his cock, stroking him slowly. His mouth dropped open and for a moment he forgot how to work his tongue.

  “Want you.” She stroked him again.

  His arms were steel around her as he pushed her back against the smooth, tiled wall of the shower. Both hands cupping her ass, he pried his lips off hers to turn his head. There was a sprayer in here that should be just the right height for what he wanted…

  Finding it, he slid her down the wall a few inches until—

  “Oh!” Her eyes flew open, her butt cheeks clinching beneath his palms.

  “Stay there. Lean back,” he instructed.

  Watching him with wide green eyes, she did as she was told, which was amazing, because she never did anything he told her to do. But the sensations the water pressure was causing on a certain part of her body must have been worth it, because her eyes slid to half-mast. With the water doing its work, he thumbed her nipples and kissed her deeply. She moaned and the vibration slid down his throat and radiated off his spine. He explored the length of her neck with his tongue, nudging her head back with his nose. Impatiently, her hips wiggled.

  Yeah, she liked this a lot.

  Continuing to roll one nipple between his fingers, he slid his other hand between her folds until he found her clit. This might be his favorite part of her. That tiny spot of perfection packed the biggest punch. The most bang for his buck. He knew, after being between her legs last night, that she reacted to the slightest—

  “Oh God!” She jerked her head back again, her face pulled into a beautiful mask of pleasure-and-pain. He continued torturing her, slipping along her silken skin until her cries turned to muffled whimpers and her teeth dug into her plush bottom lip. His hand left the nipple he’d been rolling between thumb and forefinger to catch her when her knees gave out. And they did. A few strokes later, Sofie gave him her weight. He supported her, while her arms around his neck held on tight.

  He kissed her ear and whispered, “You are gorgeous when you come.”

  Hands on her ass, he lifted her so that her back rested against the wall and her thighs wrapped around his hips. He positioned himself at her entrance.

  “Now let’s see you do it again,” he said, sliding home.

  A sharp cry rang from her throat as he encased himself in her liquid heat.

  “Can’t,” she argued, clinging to his shoulders.

  “Yeah, sweetheart, you can.” He slid in and out smoothly, given how she was wet and ready for him. The high, tight sounds in her throat had started already. “Told you.”

  He grinned, loving the feel of her wrapped around him absolutely everywhere. Loved the way her nipples abraded his chest, the way her hands pulled at the ends of his hair. Loved the way her ankles ground into his back, hard enough to cause bruises, urging him to continue.

&nbs
p; Their shared breaths echoed off the shower walls, blending in with the sound of water spraying in every direction. He pumped into her, encouraging her with his words.

  “Come.”

  It wasn’t fancy; he just told her what he wanted.

  “Come for me, Scampi.” He drove into her again. “Come, baby.”

  He didn’t know how long he repeated his request—until his legs had grown tired and the water had gone cool. Still, he did not give up. When she went over, she did it with a full body shudder, locking her arms around him. Her lips on his ear, she moaned and pleaded. And the feel of her warm breath, the sound of those pleas and cries, and knowing he took her there, that she’d obeyed his commands, were what he needed to reach his own climax.

  His release shot down his arms and legs, across his back, making the water feel electrified as it pierced his skin.

  Holding himself and her, he turned his back to the shower wall, then slid down, keeping hold of her hips. When his butt hit the floor, he rested his head against the wall, his legs and arms spent. He caught his breath and opened his eyes, his lashes fluttering to keep out the cool water spraying around them. Didn’t help. Water blurred the scene in front of him, blurred Sofie’s face.

  Even blurry, he could make out her smile, her honest emerald eyes. He was inside her, wrapped in her from head to toe.

  And right now, she was everything he needed.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Exhaustion never felt so grand.

  Currently, Sofie was battling her well-earned tiredness with her third cup of rainforest-certified coffee. She could get used to being oversexed, sleep-deprived, and caffeinated. Yes. Yes, she could.

  Donovan made a huge avocado bacon omelet for breakfast. They shared it, hovering over the countertop, feeding each other bites. She was wearing one of Donovan’s T-shirts, a strange match for the prim pencil skirt, and was scuttling around in a pair of his socks. The weather may be warming up, but the floors of the mansion had not received the memo.

  Shuffling into the ballroom, Sofie sipped from her coffee mug and decided to check in with Faith. She asked if there were any messages. There weren’t. “Well, I’m here if you need me to measure anything else.”

  Faith snorted. “Hmm, there is something I’d like to know the size of…”

  “I’m talking about the ballroom.”

  “Well, I would hope there’s room in his pants for those, too.” Laughter trickled through the phone.

  “Are you through?” Sofie sighed, but she smiled.

  “Do not play innocent with me, missy. I know you’ve been sexed up, down, and probably sideways from the sound of your voice.”

  She was not wrong.

  Faith sniffed after her bout of laughter and got down to business. “Anyway. Pretty slow morning. The normal glut of e-mails to answer, but I’ve got it under control.”

  Sofie could kiss her. “Did I give you a raise yet?”

  “Not yet.” She seemed to sober. “I happened to talk to Gretchen today.” A friend of Faith’s who worked at Abundance Market. “I guess Michael and Cookie are no more. He found her banging the stockroom guy. Told you she was a tramp.”

  “With the stamp to prove it,” Sofie added helpfully.

  “Damn straight.” There was a pregnant pause, then Faith said, “He called me last night.”

  Uh-oh.

  “I didn’t answer,” she was quick to add. “Which is why I called Gretchen this morning. To get the scoop. He’s single. And she said he’s not doing too well. He’s miserable, apparently. I think we’re both trying to figure out where to go from here. How to move on from a future that didn’t go as planned.”

  Sofie clucked her tongue. “Honey…”

  “I know what you’re going to say.” Her friend heaved a sigh. “But you don’t know what it was like with Michael and me, when we were alone. Everyone makes mistakes. God knows I’ve made mistakes.”

  “Yes, but you didn’t make a mistake with another person.”

  “Sofie,” Faith said, her tone both resolute and gentle, “I’m not going to lecture you about climbing back into bed with the guy who stole your virginity and broke your heart.”

  Silence clung to the seconds stretching between them.

  “It’s a bad idea. If he cheats once, he will cheat again,” Faith said. “That’s what you want to tell me.”

  “No.” Sofie put her coffee mug down on the bar and sat on a backless stool. “That’s not what I want to tell you,” she said, her voice echoing in the cavernous ballroom. I want to tell you he made a mistake he will never make again. I want to tell you he still loves you. I want to tell you that you and Michael will walk down a long, white runner in a big garish church where you both say your I dos. I want to tell you you’ll buy a house with a picket fence and have two children. Honey, that’s what I want to tell you. That’s what I want for you. But I don’t have a crystal ball. I’m not sure what’s going to happen between the two of you.”

  “I want that, too,” Faith said quietly. “I want all of that. Watching the years I had with Michael wash down the drain… What if I let him go and I wasn’t supposed to? What if this is my destiny? What if we are meant to have those two children you just mentioned?” Her voice was full of hope, and it broke Sofie’s heart to hear.

  Hope.

  She could relate. A very similar emotion was swirling in her chest now. She was filled with hope. And wasn’t Donovan proof that people could change? He was different from what he used to be. Wasn’t it possible for Michael to change, too?

  “I’m going to call him, Sofe. I can’t see the harm in a phone call. And I can’t push him away, pretend he doesn’t exist. We had a home together at one point.”

  “I know.”

  “He never did anything like this when we were together. And it is no secret that I have been putting off planning our wedding for a very long time. Maybe we both got cold feet… it was just that his led him to someone else.”

  She had to give it to her friend. If Faith was willing to overlook Michael cheating on her, she had a more forgiving heart than Sofie. She just hoped Faith wasn’t making the biggest mistake of her life by making that phone call.

  Sofie found Donovan outside, bent over a round hole in the ground where he was stacking bricks. The sun blazed hot overhead and he wore a pair of sunglasses, a black folded bandanna over his head. He looked so much like the Donny in her memory her heart gave a little leap.

  Donny. The man who’d made her see stars this morning after making her see fireworks last night. The man who had a tattoo matching hers because he considered her one of his scars. Was this really happening to her?

  Rather than say what she was thinking, instead she went with, “Hi.”

  “Scampi,” he greeted, continuing to place bricks in a circle.

  “What you doing?”

  “Fire pit.” He looked up at her and grinned, that sinister smile below dark shades doing funny things to her stomach. “I know how you like s’mores.”

  She guessed he winked from under those dark lenses, but she couldn’t be sure.

  The sound of an engine firing in the distance had her looking out at the field. Connor, astride a lawnmower, held up a hand to wave. She waved back.

  “Figured if the kids are going to be camping out here,” Donovan said, pushing himself up, “they might want to make s’mores and shit.”

  She didn’t hide the amusement in her voice when she repeated, “S’mores and… shit?”

  “Yeah.” His grin widened.

  “You smell good.” Like outside. A hint of perspiration glistened on his forehead.

  Closing in on her, he said, “Me being sweaty turning you on?”

  “Everything about you turns me on,” she admitted, and heard the catch in her breath.

  “What I like to hear.” He lowered his head and kissed her lips.

  She tasted the salt on his skin, and a hint of coffee on his mouth. Gosh. Why was he so sexy? In a flash, she sympa
thized with Faith. There was something comforting about the familiar. And even though it’d been years since Sofie had been around Donovan, he was familiar. If she were being honest, she didn’t know exactly what she would do if she were in her friend’s shoes. After all, here she was with Donny after promising herself she’d never give him another piece of her again.

  “I have to run some errands,” she said, not wanting to mull over her sordid thoughts. “I came out to see if you could drive me home.”

  “Not a problem.” He gestured with his chin to the fire pit still-in-progress. “We can try this out tonight.”

  Surprised, she asked, “You want me to come back?”

  He ran both hands up her arms, beneath the sleeves of the T-shirt, his eyes on hers. “Scampi, babe. I want you here every night. Thought that would’ve been pretty clear to you by now.”

  It wasn’t. Things weren’t clear at all. What they were… Well, things were amazing, that’s what they were. Her pragmatic, self-aware side wondered how many nights “every night” would end up being. Wondered what happened after he returned to New York… after he sold the house…

  She had so many questions but not an ounce of fortitude to ask a single one of them.

  “Cute as you look in my shirt, you may want to bring some of your own clothes. Can’t guarantee you won’t end up in a velour jumpsuit if you rely on what’s stashed in the basement.”

  “Okay, but I may keep the shirt. I like it.” It smelled like him.

  His eyes grazed over the baggy tee. “Keep it.” He put his teeth on his bottom lip and whistled. “Gertie!”

  Gertie. He called Dog Gertie. Warmth rolled through her chest like a red carpet. For some reason his doing so was significant. A sign of progress, maybe?

  “Let me get her inside and we’ll get you home,” he said, blessedly unaware of her thoughts. Or the hope blooming inside her anew. “Lunch before you go?”