Shelter

by Stephanie Fournet

  “Besides,” I hedged with a shrug. “That water’s probably freezing.”

  He gave a lazy shake of his head. “Once you’re in, the temp’s fine.”

  “Fine? Not warm? Oh man. Now I know it’s freezing.”

  His laugh was quiet, but it had me grinning. “You were always afraid of the cold.”

  I shook my head in protest. “I’m not afraid. I just hate it!”

  Laughing harder, he wrapped his hand around my ankle and gave it a gentle tug. “Just sit on the edge and dip your feet in. You’ll see.”

  This suggestion didn’t seem too terrible, but I let go a frustrated sigh anyway. “Fine,” I said, lowering myself to the cool cement. I sat lotus-style first, marshalling my courage. “Jeez. This ledge is already freezing my butt. The water is going to be so much worse.”

  Choking on his laughter, Cole edged closer to me. “I promise to warm your butt. Now put your feet into the water.” He closed a hand around the arch of my left foot and pulled it slowly toward him. Our eyes locked, and the laughter in his morphed to something molten and heavy. “Just trust me, Elise.”

  We both knew he was talking about more than just the water, but I didn’t put up a fight as he lowered my leg — from toes to mid-calf — into the pool. I hissed at the cold, my abs pulling tight.

  “Relax,” he coaxed, running his hands up and down my submerged limb, massaging it with steady pressure.

  And, yeah, that felt good. Soon the only part of my lower leg still cold was the line where water met air.

  I held my breath and offered him my right leg. He dipped it into the water, and while it was no warmer than before, I was ready for the shock.

  “That’s it.” His voice was low and honeyed, and I wanted to move closer to it. I slid to the edge of the pool ledge, letting the water climb over my knees. Cole stepped between them, running his hands higher.

  “C’mon, baby.” He wrapped his arms low around my back, and at his touch and his words, I took the plunge. The cold had me gasping, and I was shocked to discover that my feet found no purchase, save Cole’s sturdy legs. I flailed helplessly for a moment before he pulled me against him. I gripped his shoulders

  “It’s deep here, but I’ve got you.”

  Cole swam us closer to the shallow end, and I felt when his feet braced against the bottom.

  I’d gone in up to my shoulders, and Cole’s shirt was now almost completely soaked. My teeth started chattering.

  He studied me, a line forming between his brows. “You’re that cold?”

  I nodded, knowing I couldn’t speak without stuttering.

  “Get closer.” Releasing my waist, Cole hooked me under each knee and brought my legs around him. I moaned at the contact. The skin of his waist was deliciously warm. And then I felt the fever hot length of his erection press against my inner thigh. My sex clenched in response.

  “Cole.” I sighed his name.

  He wrapped his arms around me again, squeezing me tight. His lip met the hollow just below my earlobe. “I’m right here, and I’m not going anywhere.”

  I closed my eyes, soaking in the feeling of weightlessness as I clung to him. I was still cold, but his body felt amazing.

  “You’re still shivering,” he said, nuzzling my neck and rubbing his hands up and down my back. He lifted his head, narrowing his gaze at me. “It’s the shirt.”

  “Wh-what?” I asked through chattering teeth.

  “Yeah, the sleeves and back are soaked. They’re sticking out of the water, and it’s chilling you.”

  I gave him my side-eye. “It sounds like you’re trying to get me to take the shirt off.”

  “Well—” He shrugged, fighting against a smile. “—I’ll admit I want you to take the shirt off, but I promise you’ll be warmer if you do.”

  I kept him pinned with my stare. “And if I take it off and I’m still cold?”

  Challenge danced in his eyes. “Then I’ll carry you inside and put you in a hot shower.”

  A hot shower with Cole sounded amazing. Why couldn’t we just skip the naked swimming part, and jump right to that?

  “Why not—”

  Cole pressed two fingers over my lips, trapping them. “Let’s try it my way first. I think you’ll like it.”

  I had to admit that, despite being cold, clinging to his body, bobbing and buoyant in the salt water had its appeal. “Fine,” I consented with a tiny nod.

  His brow quirked with mischief. “Miss Cormier, don’t sound so eager,” he teased. “You’ll get me too worked up.”

  My laughter echoed across the surface of the pool, and I felt him snicker against me.

  “Here,” he said, wrapping his hand around my nape. “Lie back.”

  I didn’t move. “What are you going to do?”

  “Elise, my love, just trust me.”

  My love. The words pulled spasms of pleasure through me. A sudden assault of bliss. Unable to respond or even close my mouth, I did the only thing I could. I obeyed.

  Lying back in his capable hold, water soaked through my hair, and my chest lifted above the surface. The night air seeped through the sopping shirt, chilling me instantly. I glanced down to find the sodden fabric flattened over me like a second skin, every pucker of my taut nipples accentuated in moonlight.

  “Christ, you’re so lovely,” Cole muttered, his voice hoarse, almost choked. He braced me in his left arm, my head now resting on his shoulder, while his right hand deftly undid each button in turn. When the shirt gaped open, Cole’s hot mouth closed over my right breast.

  I moaned, my eyes closing in surrender. The heat of his tongue was sinful, and I craved more. I slid my hand up behind his neck and wove my fingers through his damp, short-cropped hair, holding him in place.

  At my touch, a barely tamed growl issued from his throat. I loved it.

  Slowly, with obvious regret, Cole freed my breast and brought his lips to mine, kissing me once before he spoke. “You’re distracting me from my job.” He nibbled my top lip and swept his tongue over the bottom one.

  “Job?” I panted.

  He nodded. “I’m trying to undress you. I want you to swim with me. Naked.”

  He was already naked, and I was nearly there, so his words should not have sent such a thrill through me, but they had. My feet reached for the bottom, and once I was anchored, I drew my arms back and swayed them through the water until the shirt slid from me. I was about to reach for the elastic band of my panties, but Cole beat me to it, snagging them with two fingers and dragging them down my legs. With his free arm, he hooked me low around my back and lifted me just enough so I could kick them away.

  I’ll probably never see those panties again.

  And with that thought, I felt my nakedness, the keen, half-frightening-half-freeing sense that nothing separated me from the water. From the night. And that I shared this with Cole.

  A shock of aliveness clanged through my entire being. I’d never felt so alive.

  I looked into Cole’s eyes then and saw him. I saw him as he was right now. Yes, he’d always be the Cole I’d grown up with. The boy who had been my childhood nemesis. The teenager who’d pretended to ignore me while trusting me with his life. The young man who’d made me love him.

  But now he was the grown man, too. The man who had confessed his faults in a balls-out letter. Who could read my face and know when I was embarrassed or freaked out. Who’d dressed me in his shirt and given me his toothbrush. Who had said he wasn’t going anywhere.

  Who’d called me his.

  Out of the eight billion people on the planet, he was the one I wanted to be with. Now and always.

  I lunged for him.

  Cole caught me in his arms as my mouth claimed his. I kissed and kissed him, wanting to make him part of me, aching to be as close to him as I could possibly get. The way he’d wrapped his arms around me and crushed me to him hinted he felt the same.

  I tasted salt water on his lips, and I chased the flavor down his cheek and along his
jaw. I hummed into the cradle of his neck, my lips and tongue exploring the masculine sinews. With my legs hooked around his hips, I could feel him everywhere. Each of his muscles felt taut, coiled and ready to spring, as though he were holding himself back at the starting line of a race.

  “Elise,” he groaned against my ear, his words anchored in need.

  I longed to give him everything. Everything he needed. Everything he wanted. I yearned to make up for the times he’d had no one to turn to. For the nights when he’d gone without a comforting touch. For the years he’d been denied love.

  I needed to show him. I couldn’t trust myself with words. They’d be too much. They might even scare him away.

  But with touch…

  I ran one hand down the terrain of his chest, the flesh over his heart both hard and vulnerable. His male nipple was a tight peak under my touch, and breath shuddered from him as I traced it with my thumb. I placed kisses over his pecs, loving how he whispered my name again with greater urgency. Almost like a warning.

  And then Cole sprang onto his back, and I was moving through the water. Even with me clinging to him like a baby koala, Cole executed a powerful backstroke that propelled us toward the edge of the pool. And while it lasted, I felt like I was gliding through the water — naked — astride Poseidon himself.

  At the edge, about halfway between the deep and the shallow end, Cole pressed my back to the tiled surface and kissed me. Neither hard nor soft, but searching, deep, and slow. While my legs were still entwined around him, here his feet touched the bottom, the water reaching our shoulders.

  Cradling my face in his hands, Cole broke the kiss. “You’re not cold anymore.”

  I shook my head, letting my lips brush against his. Because wrapped around him like this, I wasn’t cold at all.

  His hands roamed over me, and I couldn’t get enough of his smooth, wet-slicked skin. My own hands crested his powerful shoulders, ran down his sculpted arms, and slipped freely over his plated abs. When my fingertips glided below his navel, Cole hissed a sharp breath. I reached further south until my hand closed around him. A shudder passed over his body, Cole’s eyelids drooping with desire. In my grip, he was a paradox. Vital and hard. Febrile and silken. So powerful. So vulnerable. I stroked him, and the muscles all over his torso seemed to dance with tension.

  I wanted to watch it happen again — being the source of his heated arousal made me dizzy — but when I moved to make the slow journey from the base of him back up to the tip, Cole grabbed my wrist. Before I knew what was happening, both of our hands were behind my back, and Cole was kissing me. Hard.

  “I already lost control once tonight,” Cole panted against my lips before claiming them again. “Now I’m going to take my time with you.”

  I sucked in a breath. Cole taking his time with me sounded like heaven. I held him tighter, weightless in body and soul. I loved the feel of him caught between legs, clasping my hands. He was so solid. Permanent. Real.

  Mine.

  I wanted him to be mine like nothing else. I wanted this — the moment we were sharing under the silent sky — every single night. And if I couldn’t have that, I didn’t want this night to end.

  But staying still and frozen in time was not in Cole’s plan. His kisses moved lower until I felt him boost me higher on him so his mouth could suckle my breasts again. The night air tickled my wet skin with its chill, but now I burned so hot the only shivers that coursed through me were ones of pleasure.

  Cole’s tongue licked and teased one budded peak before moving to the other. The heat of his mouth was exquisite. He crushed me to him as though he couldn’t get enough. His fingers dug into my flesh, one hand spanning the middle of my back, the other clutching my hip.

  He pulled away, breathing hard. Moonlight revealed a starved, desperate look in his pale blue eyes. I felt like they were looking right into me.

  “I don’t deserve you, but God help me, I have to have you,” he rasped.

  I brought my hand to his cheek, stunned at his words. “You deserve everything you want.”

  “You. Only you.”

  Cole lowered me in his arms until we were face to face, and then he was kissing me again. Such kisses. They were like sun-warmed honey pouring over my lips straight into my veins. Their sweet heat soaked me in pleasure and raised my pulse. I moaned my thanks for them.

  Cole’s lips never left mine, but one of his hands moved from my back, and I was dimly aware of him reaching for the towel. My sluggish, blissed-out mind concluded — quite contently — that we would soon be leaving the pool, heading back to the bedroom.

  But in the next instant, Cole caught me at the waist and hoisted me out of the pool. I found myself sitting on the ledge, my legs still submerged as water streamed from my naked torso.

  “Lie back,” Cole whispered.

  Confused, I frowned. “What?”

  Cole placed the flat of his hand on my bare stomach. “Lie back.” He gave me a gentle push, and it was only then I realized he’d spread the towel down behind me. A quick glance at the wolfish gaze in his eyes told me exactly what would happen next. My middle seized as nerves struck.

  “Cole—”

  He planted his hands on the ledge at either side of my hips. With one great thrust, he lifted his torso out of the water, forcing me to stagger back on my hands. Dripping with salt water and gazing at me like some lust-driven merman, Cole levered forward slowly, urging me down.

  “Lie. Back.”

  I lowered to my elbows, stubborn to the last, but also unable to take my eyes from him. Cole gave me a dry arch of his brow .

  “Good enough.” He raked his gaze over me, his eyes fixing on the tiara at the very top of my thigh, just under my bikini line.

  “Fucking gorgeous.” He bent to the mark and claimed it with an open-mouthed kiss. I bit my lip at the shock of pleasure.

  He splashed back into the water, his hands landing on my knees. With no more warning, he pushed them apart and shouldered his way between my legs. My heart pumped in rapid, clumsy beats. And when Cole’s hands gripped the back of my thighs and tugged my hips toward him, all that heart-pumping seemed to do no good because my lungs couldn’t take in enough air.

  Wearing a heated, hungry look, Cole kept his gaze locked with mine as he slowly lowered his head. The first thing I felt was his breath, a flicker of cool torture on my soaked flesh. My hips rolled when he pressed his nose into the spare thatch of curls at the crest of my pubic bone, a pulse of pleasure coursing through me. I watched him close his eyes as a low moan left his throat.

  But when his searing tongue swept up my seam, my head fell back against the towel. He parted my sensitive flesh, and my breath shook from me. When I writhed in agonized pleasure, Cole wrapped his powerful arms up and over my thighs, clamping them down. The moment I realized I was completely at his mercy, Cole’s tongue found my aching clit.

  I lost myself to the feel of him, the thrilling, throbbing sweetness. The sound of water splashing reached my ears, and I discovered I was the source. My thighs may have been trapped, but my feet kicked as muscles strained, tension built.

  He was slow at first, moving in broad sweeps, slower than the rush of air in my lungs. But soon, my sighs became cries, soft and helpless, and he answered them with pace and pressure. I arched my back, turning my face to the night sky. Even with the bright moon, scores of stars gave me their light. The exact color of his eyes. The color I’d always chased.

  “Cole—” His name took flight from me, aiming for the stars. I shut my eyes as a thousand distant suns exploded behind my closed lids.

  With the sound of a crashing wave, his dripping body suddenly covered mine, nudging me higher onto solid earth, so that when my heels sought purchase to welcome his weight, they grounded on terra firma.

  “Elise.” He rasped my name as if it were a plea, and I opened for him. My body. My heart. As the crest of my climax ebbed away, a tenderness I’d never known washed over me. Beneath Cole, gazing up at the des
perate need in his eyes, I wanted nothing more than to offer myself as his home.

  He pressed the crown of his sex against me, and I tilted my hips to draw him inside. His eyes, unguarded and raw, locked with mine as he slowly… slowly… entered. In that moment, I knew I’d never be the same. I’d never feel this close, this claimed with anyone else. And no matter what happened, I’d never want to. Only Cole.

  “Only you,” I heard myself whisper, stroking his beautiful, stricken face.

  “Always you,” he answered, the fingers of both his hands meeting behind my head, cradling me gently.

  I wanted to tell him I’d love him for the rest of my life. I’d be his safe place till the end of my days. That he’d never have to shoulder his burdens alone. He’d never have to go without comfort. Here, now, I felt safe enough, sure enough to promise him everything. I opened my mouth to give him the words when Cole moved inside me.

  “Oh, God…” My eyes drifted closed as Cole’s every stroke called back all of the pieces of me he’d scattered with my climax. With each surge into me, he built a tower of tension and desire. And with him inside me, above me, around me, he built it higher and higher. Soon, the height of desire and the weight of tension would bring everything crashing down again.

  I braced for the fall, feeling the ecstasy of Cole’s body as he tightened above me, the sound of his labored breath urging me on.

  “Elise… open your eyes,” he commanded. “Look at me.”

  I obeyed, and when I did, I found him gazing back at me, heat and hope in all that blue.

  “I feel it too,” I whispered. It was nothing close to what I wanted to tell him, but at that moment, the monument he’d been building reached its teetering peak, and I arched back, head over heels, in a long, luxurious fall.

  And Cole was right there with me, driving into me again and again, until both of us found ourselves breathless and spent, tangled together on the ground.

  Chapter 28

  COLE

  Lying on top of her, buck-naked and wet under the stars, I caught my breath, took my weight on my elbows so I wouldn’t crush her, and brushed a kiss on her lips. All with just one thought in mind.