My heartbeat soars. “I never saw you coming. The one thing I never wanted … is the one thing I never want to be without.”
“You know you’re something, right?” he says.
“I know I'm something to you.”
“No, you’re something.” He looks at me for a loving moment.
“And you’re not? Lenic, all those women aren’t screaming for nothing. You’re not exactly average and I don't mean your gladiator body or your killer looks or your to-die-for eyelashes.” He laughs softly. I bite my bottom lip. “When we met … all I wanted with you was sex. Just sex. Lots of sex. All kinds of sex. Though, even if you take it gracefully up my backside, no an—”
“Yeah, I get it. Not even on my birthday,” he chuckles. “And you make a man feel like a piece of meat.”
“You were. And I’m realising now it wasn’t right. I went from one extreme to another. I grew from a child who didn’t laugh to an adult who didn’t take anything seriously. Because if I did, then it would mean I’d have to care. And I’d spent a lifetime telling the world I didn’t give a damn. But I do. I definitely give a damn about you.”
I would never have guessed in a million years that the dead-serious raging Tempest — my anchor, my rock — would teach me that life isn’t all fun and games, one giant playground. There is one thing in life that should be taken seriously.
Love.
“You wanna know why I fell in love with you?” he asks.
“I thought it was because of this arse you can’t stop thinking about.”
He laughs low in his throat. “Good guess, but try again.”
“I’m not sure why,” I admit quietly.
His tender smile lights up my whole face. “Some days I was barely holding it together. I wasn't living — I was surviving. Every day was the same. Nothing happened. Work, train, eat, repeat. You changed it, knocked me off this repetitive course. But it isn’t why I fell in love with you. And it isn’t because you’re the prettiest girl in the world, or because you're funny, witty, intelligent, unique, a little outrageous — in a good way.” I laugh softly. “And it isn’t because you’re helping me to accept things either.”
“Why then?”
“You’re kind, Felicity, and it blew everything out of the water.” I feel myself flush. “I saw it first in your commitment with the charity the night of the fundraiser, and then again with Rose. It didn’t take guts to do what you did that night to help her. You did it out of kindness.” He slips his arms around me, holding me close to his body. “Fell hard for you that night. It’s why I couldn’t leave without kissing you.”
My chest gets tight and I have an overwhelming urge to laugh just to get my heart restarted again. “I think I fell for you that night too,” I manage to say.
“You did?”
“Yes. I always felt there was something missing inside of me. But that night, I felt it in my heart.” He presses a brief, light kiss on the top of my head, and we stay in each other’s arms for a while. I love it when he hugs me. It is the best feeling in the world.
It is one of those nights when the air is perfectly still and the stars shine bright and the world seems to stand still. Just for us.
Then I remember. Pulling back, I dig out the origami swan from my bag, and hold it out to him. “Are you telling me I took your virginity?”
His chuckle is throaty and deep. “Sorry to disappoint.”
I lift a shoulder. “You wouldn’t have won my heart if you’d failed to please me in bed. Or should I say: alleyway, shower, staircase.” My lips slowly curl up at the edges. He just shakes his head with a crooked smile.
“I never told you this before…” He takes the swan from my hand. “My sister taught me how to do this.”
I feel my heart swell. It is almost like he was creating pieces of her and then giving them to me.
“Reminds me of Bethany. She used to—” He laughs. “It was her that left hidden messages inside. But she would write insults. The first one she gave me said, ‘Whoever holds this swan has the fattest arse in the world.’ She didn’t tell me about it until a few months later.”
“I think I would have really adored your sister.”
“I think she would have loved you too.” He winds his fingers through my hair. “Wanna come to Canada next month? Meet the family? Told them all about you.”
Meet his parents?
“Don’t look so worried, beautiful.”
I hold my breath. “What if they don’t—?”
“My parents already love you. I’ve told them all about you. Haven’t talked about anything else with my mum. It’s all been you.”
“You’ve spoken about me to them?”
He nods, stroking my hair. “West isn't the only family you have left in this world. You're a part of my family now. And we have a big family — lots of cousins. And I don’t want you to worry, alright. Make them laugh the way you did with me and they’ll fall in love with you just as easily as I did. Just don’t sit too close to Uncle Lenny. He’s got wandering hands.” I let out a soft laugh, and look into those beautiful dark eyes, sparkling my way. “So, beautiful, you gonna come with?”
“I’d love to come. It will be my honour to meet the great man who created the legendary life-saving arse drink.”
When his laughter fixes me in place, I hear the rush of my heart. “What does being your first mean, then?”
My heart flutters at the intensity in his expression and the way his eyes are so focused. It reminds me of the way he looks at me when he is trying to push me over the edge, waiting for me to cum, so we can come undone together. He is waiting for something now, wanting something.
“I need you to know this,” he says, his voice rough, rasping with emotion. “You — no matter what, no matter if you stop feeling this — you will always be my first priority. That will never change,” he tells me in that deep, masculine timbre that makes my heart explode into a thousand butterflies.
“I’ll never stop feeling this,” I say desperately, stroking my hand down his face, until he catches it in his other hand and kisses it.
“I love you,” he whispers fiercely. “I was afraid to love someone, scared I would lose them like I lost Bethany, like I lost good men in the Navy. Hurt all over again. But you’ve shown me, time and time again, that you're not like other people. You’re strong. You bite back. Something tells me I will never need to worry about you. I can just … love you.”
He squeezes my hand and I glance down. It has become something of a message between us. Holding hands. A message that we’re in this together, that we will have each other for support for the rest of our lives, that we are never going to break apart.
I turn my eyes away from our locked hands and up into his gaze to see real happiness on his face. I reach up to brush my fingertips along the line of his jaw, and then replace my fingers with my lips. He really is too sweet, too perfect. I feel like if someone pinches me, I will wake up and realise that all of this ... that he is nothing but a dream, a figment of my wishful imagination.
This can’t be real.
I am shot straight back to reality, when all of a sudden Lenic turns to face the cliff edge and shouts, “I’m in love with Felicity Saint James! I love her! I goddamn love this woman!” He laughs, almost nervously, before continuing his shouting declaration, the stars bright in the clear black sky. “Felicity Saint James — you can hook, line, and fuck me any day!”
He turns to me, his shoulders still shaking from laughter, his hand still not letting go of mine. “The future’s uncertain, but I know one damn thing for sure. You’re a firecracker. You’re unpredictable. And you do whatever the hell you please. But there’s one thing I know I'm gonna make you do.” He tightens our grip and then pulls his hands around my hips.
“Is this your ego talking?”
“Confidence, baby.”
I feel his body press into mine, and then moan softly as he drags kisses along my neck. My hands sprawl across his shoulders. I real
ly do love to feel him like this. I love to press my fingers into every groove of muscle he has, just to know they are there. Does he really need this white collared shirt on?
“Tell me. What are you going to make me do?”
He pulls away. “One day soon … I’m gonna ask you to marry me and I’m not taking no for an answer.”
Barely breathing, I open my mouth to speak but nothing will come out. The palpable disbelief, mixed with love and relief, makes me dizzy with an overwhelming emotion.
The good guy doesn't finish last in my story. And that is exactly what Lenic is.
One of the good guys.
He doesn’t make me feel unwanted. He doesn’t let me feel like I can’t trust him with other attractive women fawning over him. He is a jealous possessive alpha-male but he doesn’t ever try to control me or manipulate me. He doesn’t doubt our love by saying he doesn’t deserve me and that I can do better than him. He knows he is the only man for me, because of who he is and what he isn’t.
This common notion that only bad boys can keep a woman keen is utter bullshit. Lenic puts a fire in my belly and lights up my whole freaking world. He loves me in a way that most women would die for.
Bad boys have nothing on this good man.
‘Not even close.’
I know deep in my heart he will never hurt me, cheat on me, leave me. Living a life with that kind of security is what will keep me on my toes; keep me excited for my future. The possibilities are endless when they’re the good kind.
“You're crazy," I tell him, not for the first time.
His smile grows. "For you," he replies with a wide, toothy grin. “I love you. I want to take care of you, be with you until the day I die … and not even then.”
I never planned or wanted for this. All this emotional stuff changing who I am and what I will be. I feel out of control. I had a plan and love was never a part of it, and neither was risking myself for a fall. Death is inevitable in life and I could lose Lenic like I lost my parents and my grandfather. It will tear my soul apart the day I no longer feel his hand wrap around mine. But people who experience grief like that are the lucky ones. Because you only truly grieve if you’ve truly loved. And loving and being loved might sound like a cliché, but it’s what everyone’s looking for. True love leaves your heart open and fragile, and there is always a chance it will be broken or taken away. But what a feeling, eh? What a damn feeling.
“I’ve never been anyone’s girlfriend before, never mind a wife. I could be hopeless at it,” I say quietly.
“We can be hopeless in love together.”
He kisses me, slow and gentle, leaving me whimpering and shuddering under his gaze. He pulls back to appraise me, those dark-brown eyes studying me with a tenderness I’d never seen until I met him. It is eyes like this, which get you in trouble. Eyes that show you care about something. Eyes that prove you feel something.
“What if I don’t make it easy for you? What if I keep saying no?”
“You’re thinking of the impossible. But I like watching you when you think.”
“I like to think about you. A lot.”
His eyes crinkle as he laughs and he presses his body against mine. As his lips and teeth travel up the underside of my chin, as his teeth dig into the flesh of my bottom eager lip, I groan, taking it, my heart scratching and digging its way out of my chest for him.
“Wanna do some thinking right now?”
“Here?” I ask, breathless.
“There’s a lot to think hard on.” He unbuttons his white shirt. “We’d better get started. What’d you say?” His gaze is heated, his voice thickened with desire.
I cup his face and drag my hand down the sharp line of his cheek. “Think my brains out, Lenic Reevus. Think me until I can’t think no more.”
I slowly pull off his shirt and drop it to the ground, looking at his naked torso, and drink it all in. Smoothing my hands down his front, I grace every muscle and sinew with a slow, teasing touch. I like doing this.
I like worshipping him.
He slowly pushes my hands up and around his neck, and I feel him drag down the zipper at the back of my black dress.
“Will Cross be angry with you for throwing the fight?”
He slides my dress over my hips and down my legs. “He’ll understand,” he groans, but it almost comes out as a growl, his hands falling onto my thighs. He squeezes the skin before his fingers trail up to finger the red lace of my underwear. When I look down at him, he is staring at my lower body, his eyes going over every detail of my lingerie. When I reach down to touch his face, he leans into my touch, kissing my palm. "I could get off just by looking at you in this.”
I smile at him; loving him more for his endless stream of compliments, that are always, mostly, about the little things.
He starts kissing me against the front of my underwear, making me gasp and shiver, until he slowly travels up the length of my body. I sigh again as he reaches my collarbone, my neck, and eventually my lips.
“Don’t worry about Cross. He’s always going on about starting up a stuntman company with me.” He kisses me softly on the lips, intertwining our hands. “Besides, he’s not the boss of me,” he chuckles, laying me down on the soft grass.
“Of course he’s not. I’m your woman so that automatically makes me the boss of you. Actually, make that your captain. After all, I always like to go down with your big ship.”
Big of heart, he lets out a booming laugh that rivals my own and Grandpa Joe’s. And I am going to make damn sure it is as common as the smile on my face.
I am the luckiest freaking girl in the world. Lenic and I are one and the same. That is why we fell in love, driven by the same compulsion within us.
Kindness.
It brought us together. It is our one constant. It is powerful, rare. Like finding the light at the end of a never-ending tunnel. We are drawn to it. And we will do whatever it takes to never let it out of sight. Out of mind.
“You ready?” he asks softly.
“You’d better believe it, you handsome fuck.”
He fists the back of my hair and softly pulls me to his lips. He immediately deepens the kiss, pressing all of his weight against my body as his hands travel down my sides. He pulls at the lace of my delicate lingerie, but relatively lets it be, pulling himself up to bring my knees to his sides so he can unstrap my stilettos.
“I could get off just by watching you walk in these.” I smile, and watch as he carelessly hurls my heels on the ground before throwing me a smile. "Take off my trousers," he commands in a low and husky voice, and I feel tingles down my thighs.
My fingers work against the belt buckle slowly, and I sit up to lay him down. He goes without a fight, smirking as his eyes darken, and I shimmy off his trousers. My eyes travel down his perfect form before my hands join in. His painfully evident bulge grows as I lay my hand on it, cupping him.
"Could this get you off?" I ask innocently, with a small smile. He closes his eyes, biting his lip and nodding. "Good," I whisper, pulling his briefs off his body. His eyes snap open when I lower myself on him.
His fingers immediately go down to my face, sweeping back my hair, and I lean into his touch. My hand spreads on his hard abs, and I relish in the heat from his body under my fingertips. “Oh baby," he moans loudly, when my tongue teases his wet tip. "Oh, baby. Just like that — fuck." He sighs as I take him in my mouth and suck slowly, stroking him.
He growls after a moment, then pounces on me, rolling us over so I’m underneath the prodigious size of his body. My hair falls all around me like a halo, and I glance up at him with a twinkle in my eyes. His nimble hands go straight to my bra, undoing it in seconds. He throws it away before lowering himself onto me.
He leans his forehead against mine, and smiles. "Hey…" he whispers, the very first word we said to each other.
I run my hand up his chest and smile up at him. "Hey…" I whisper back, bringing my hands up to drag across the sides of his short hair,
tilting his head.
I sigh softly when his lips touch mine, and lift my body up to meet him, relishing in the warmth of him against the cold night. His hands go down to my waist, while his tongue goes along my lower lip, and I almost faint. I have no idea why this kiss is making me so dizzy, but it’s like it is the first kiss we have shared.
My hands go around his neck, and he deepens the kiss. His hand reaches farther down and rips my underwear in two to get them out of his way. I feel his rock-solid cock throb against my drenched pussy. It is incredible and so amazing and I love him. I really truly love him.
We are each other’s first love, and we will be each other’s last.
If all the pain, if all the heartache led to this point right here … then it was all worth it.
“You have me twisted around your little finger,” he rasps softly, twisting his hand into the back of my hair. “Don’t hold back, beautiful. Pull harder.” He tugs on his hold, ever so hard. I gasp, arching my back, pressing our heated bodies together.
He sucks on my neck, scraping with his teeth, then raises his head to kiss me firmly on the mouth, like he can’t get enough of me.
“I love you,” I moan against his lips, his breath warm and tasting faintly of whiskey.
His gaze intensifies as he whispers throatily, “I love you more,” and then he roughly captures my mouth and kisses me. I taste the coppery tang of blood and don’t bloody care. I kiss him back just as hard, teeth clashing, tongues snaking out to flick against one another as our bodies battle, slamming into each other mercilessly, fingers digging in hard enough to leave marks if not bruises, hip bones meeting, flesh raked and stinging.
When he pulls back I whimper, feeling the loss immediately. He smirks devilishly, lowering himself down to my heat. His tongue flicks at my entrance, sucking, licking, and doing all he can to make me squirm.
The Tempest Page 33