Til There Was U

by Dianne Castell

  She took his hands and held them tight as his eyes gazed into hers. They were sort of washed-out blue, like the sky on a cloudy day, but they were kind and vulnerable. Vulnerable was damn good. She said, “I’m so glad you like the idea. It’s the real you, Conrad. I can tell. You have fantastic ideas.”

  He held her hands tighter. “There’s nothing better than building something yourself to get a feeling of accomplishment. We both know that.” Like hell! “And what I like most is we’re doing it together.”

  Thelma looked at Conrad’s fingers intertwined with hers. How had this sudden attraction happened between them? Yesterday she’d gone on a picnic with him to get out of the house for a while, and today he was bringing her flowers and they were holding hands and she was helping him build a patio onto Hastings House. He’d said he was a changed man, wanted to prove it to her, and he wanted to be with her.

  And right now she wanted nothing more than to be with Conrad. She’d never met anyone like him . . . ever.

  But this mutual fascination was so sudden. And crazy. Twenty-four hours ago she didn’t even like Conrad Hastings and was far from convinced that he liked her. But now . . .

  His eyes were deep brown, sincere, gazing at her as if she were the last woman on earth. But she wasn’t the last woman on earth; heck, she wasn’t even the last woman on the Landing. For sure she wasn’t the prettiest or the youngest or richest, all the attributes that attracted Conrad.

  What had happened to make him feel this way about her? To make him change?

  “Let’s take a walk down to the creek,” she said, trying to break the spell that surrounded her, needing time to figure things out.

  “It’s weedy and buggy, and we’re hungry.” His eyes darkened to cocoa. He took his one hand from her and gently tucked a strand of hair behind her left ear, making her shiver, her breathing stop. “Very hungry,” he said, his voice low and sensual and needy.

  She might not be the most experienced woman on the Landing, but she knew the difference between hungry and hungry.

  She laughed, but it was a nervous laugh, not one of those ha-ha kind but the holy-moly now-what-have-I-gotten-myself-into kind. She said, “The creek’s not all that far. We can pace it off, figure out how long the path should be. Maybe we’ll be able to see it from the new patio and ...”

  He looked her dead in the eyes, and she had no idea what she wanted to say next.

  “We?”

  She blushed. She could feel the heat crawling up her neck and settling in her cheeks. “I mean you. The we is you and me putting it in ... the bricks, I mean ... for the patio.” Time to shut up, Thelma!

  His fingers touched her cheek, then trailed down to her throat. His other hand held hers a little tighter. Her heart fluttered. She hadn’t known her heart could still do such a thing. For sure it was out of practice. But flutter over Conrad Hastings? This was all so strange. And then he looked into her eyes, and it didn’t feel strange at all. It just felt really good.

  He leaned toward her, their bodies almost touching now. He lowered his head and whispered, “You are so beautiful. I don’t know why it took me so long to see just how attractive and interesting and irresistible you are.”

  The whole world tilted. Was she ready for this? Where was this all coming from, and most important, where the heck was it going? She yanked her hands free of his, took a step back, then walked quickly off into the undergrowth, following some weedy path that she figured led to the creek. “We need to see the creek before we can draw up plans,” she called over her shoulder. “We’re not sure exactly how far away it is, and we need to check.”

  How pathetic of an excuse was that? The brush and weeds whipped against her ankles, but she kept going faster and faster. Amazing what apprehension and inexperience could make a woman do.

  “Wait up.” She heard Conrad’s voice behind her. She had no idea where she was going or what the heck she was doing. Should she kiss Conrad or not kiss him? Fall for him or not?

  Was she falling? This fast? Too fast? Twenty-four hours was fast by anyone’s standards. How had life suddenly gotten so complicated? She followed the path around a tree and nearly slid into the creek, pulling herself up short at the last moment, her back against Conrad’s firm chest, his arms winding around her, holding onto her.

  He turned her around to face him. His hot breath falling across her lips made her feel hot, too, and it had nothing to do with the July temperature.

  Biids darted here and there; the hum of the insects mixed with the trickling creek. Her heart hammered against her ribs. “Your hair’s mussed.”

  He smiled. “Want me to comb it?”

  “No, I like it this way.” He looked unkempt, less than perfect and a little vulnerable. She understood vulnerable. Suddenly Conrad wasn’t this rich playboy; he was here with her in the woods, holding her and looking imperfect.

  She rested her forehead against his chin, trying to calm her nerves. “What are we doing here, Conrad?” Catching her breath seemed impossible.

  “We’re enjoying each other, least I hope so. Don’t fight it, Thelma. What we have is so rare, so wonderful. You make me so happy.”

  “I do?” She brought her gaze to his.

  “Yes, you do. More than you can imagine. I like us together.”

  She touched his hair, and there didn’t seem to be enough oxygen in the atmosphere.

  “I want to kiss you, Thelma. I’ve wanted to for so very long. I kept thinking I’d get over you, and I never did. I felt more and more attracted to you each day, and now you’re with me. Don’t run away from me. I can’t bear it.” Then he captured her lips with his, and she thought the world would never stop spinning.

  How could this be? How could kissing Conrad be so incredible? She didn’t have a clue, but all she wanted was for the kiss, his kiss, to never end.

  Chapter 8

  “A cure? Sex!” Ryan looked down at Effie. Green eyes, blond hair, great shape, the woman he’d wanted to bed for the last year and a half.

  She said, “I know, that’s usually the guy’s line. You’re the ones who think sex is the cure for everything. But this time, I’m doing the suggesting.”

  Even with AC running full blast, heat swirled around them in the wheelhouse. “We already had this discussion, and nothing’s changed. What happens when our relationship falls apart? How are we going to work together then? I don’t want to quit my job, and neither do you.”

  She held up her hands. “Did I say anything about a relationship? I’m talking plain sex here. Fast and furious, a one-time deal to quell the beast inside.”

  He felt his eyes widen by half. “You have a beast?”

  She gave him a sultry look and growled deep in her throat. Question answered.

  “Then I leave tomorrow and go back to San Diego. All the mystique of sex between us is over, and we can get on with our lives and not be constantly wondering what if.” She swept her hair from her face, looking hotter and more enticing by the minute. “We’ll have all the answers to what if. Great idea, huh?”

  He wasn’t really sure what a growl meant but was willing to find out. “What if we like the sex?”

  Her eyes kind of crossed. “I think that’s a given, Ryan. It’s all I’ve thought about for a really long time. The salvation is we don’t really like each other; we just want each other. We get the sex out of the way, the tension is over and we go back to working together with none of the complications. You have Mr. San Diego, in your future, and I have a Chanel blouse in mine.” She kicked off her shoes.

  “You think what’s going on between us is curiosity?”

  “Or we’re in heat. Right now it’s darn hard to tell. Are you one of those guys who talks sex to death before you actually do something about it?”

  “What if having sex makes things worse between us.”

  “You are one of those taiky guys, and how can you think having sex can be worse than not having it. Look at me. I’m ready to rip my clothes off every time I see you.
”

  He arched his left brow. “No kidding.”

  She unbuttoned her blouse. Both eyebrows arched. She wasn’t kidding!

  “Am I the only one who realizes there’s enough pent-up frustration between us right now to light up the whole city of Memphis.”

  He brushed her hand from her blouse, and she said, “You don’t want to do this? I think you’re making a huge mistake by not taking me up on this offer. Think about the future. When we get back to San Diego things will be worse than ever between us. We’ll never get any work done because all we’ll be thinking about is sex and what if we’d done it and what it would have been like!”

  He looked into her eyes of darkest jade. “I want to do the unbuttoning, I’ve fantasized about your rack since the first day you walked into my office. Now I finally get to unwrap the package.”

  Every muscle in his body went rigid with anticipation. Logic and sex didn’t come together very often in his life; in fact, they never had until now. Usually his brain said something like “Ryan, this is a really bad idea” while his body said, “Go for it!” He intended to enjoy the hell out of all this sexual logic. Then Effie would go back to California and—

  “Mississippi Miss,” came a voice over the VHF radio. “This is Dodger Dog off your port bow. Everything okay? You needing some help there? Over.”

  Ryan’s fingers froze on the blouse buttons, and Effie jumped and looked around. “Who the heck’s that? Where are they?”

  He snapped up the mike on the console and turned his attention to the passing line hauler pushing twenty barges some four hundred feet away. Ryan stepped in front of Effie in case the tow captain had his binoculars out. Ryan replied into the mike, “Mississippi Miss here. Everything’s fine Dodger Dog. Breaking in a cub pilot and lost the channel. I can get her off. Over.”

  Effie tickled him in the ribs and giggled. “Get her off.. . Is that a promise?”

  Ryan nearly dropped the mike, and the captain on Dodger Dog said, “Rodger that, Mississippi Miss. Have a good one.”

  “Damn, it better be good.” Ryan puffed out a deep breath, waited ‘til the line hauler passed, then turned to Effie. “We got ourselves a problem. Every tow that passes is going to ask if we need help. This is never going to work. We should wait ‘til we get back to the Landing and—”

  The rest of the words died as Effie slid her arms around his neck and kissed him, her tongue halfway down his throat. Speech was impossible. Neither his mouth nor brain worked. Okay, forget waiting.

  “You’re right,” he panted as he reclaimed his tongue. “But all we got time for is basic no-frills sex.”

  “Basic works. I’m not asking for frills.” Her voice was ragged, her eyes dilated, looking more black than green.

  “We’re perched up here for all the world to see like goldfish in a bowl.” He glanced at the radar screen. “Another tow’s about ten minutes away.”

  Her eyes rolled around in her head, not focusing all that well. “Ten minutes. We can do ten minutes. Right now all I need is about five.”

  “Oh, flipping hell. Protection.” He reached for his back pocket and his wallet. “I don’t know if I have anything with me. I wasn’t exactly—”

  She grabbed his hand and slapped a condom into his palm. His gaze fused with hers. “You really did have this planned.”

  “Desperation does strange things to a woman. I can’t do eighteen more months of nothing.” Her fingers fumbled with the snap of his jeans. “Ten minutes and counting. I hate zippers ... should be outlawed ... only Velcro.”

  He finished with the buttons on her blouse and pushed back the sides, his eyes feasting on the little gold ring at her navel that he never would have suspected in a million years and then traveling up to her hard pink nipples straining against a white lacy bra. His heart slammed against his ribs like a crack of lightning over the Mississippi, and he suddenly felt weak. “Ohmygod.”

  He’d deal with the ring in a minute. Right now he needed to taste her sweet breasts, material and all, a fantasy come true. He opened his mouth, nearly drooling with anticipation until he felt Effie’s fingers gently close around his dick.

  He gasped, taking her nipple deep, nearly suffocating. What a way to go!

  She moaned. He did the same, but no sound escaped with his mouth full. His erection throbbed, his gut clenched, climax threatened as her hand stroked him in a seductive rhythm. With her nipple against his tongue he couldn’t tell her to slow down or this would be over in way less than ten minutes.

  Out of sheer necessity he took his mouth from her breast and looked up at her as she asked in an uneven breath, “How much time do we have left?”

  Hard to think with Effie’s breasts right in front of him and his for the taking and her massaging him.

  He looked at the monitor. Blinked a few times to clear his vision. “Six minutes or so. And you’re still in clothes.”

  “So are you.”

  He slid her blouse from her shoulders and spread it out on the captain’s chair. “This should be the right height for what we have in mind.”

  “A chair?”

  “We’re a little desperate here, sugar. A chair will-do fine.” She blushed as he unbuttoned her shorts, then unzipped them, peeling the material over her silky hips, then letting the shorts drop to the floor in a soft whoosh. “Never imagined you as a girl in pink.”

  “What did you imagine me in?”

  He gave her a devilish grin. “Nothing.”

  She huffed out a breath and blushed. “You’ve imagined me naked for eighteen months?”

  He kissed her deep. “I intend to make up for lost time.” His slid his fingers into the waistband of her panties.

  “Here, let me. We don’t have time for the slow stripping routine. And I don’t just mean because of the barges,” She brought her full open lips to his, kissed him, then bent over, sliding her panties over her hips and thighs and down her legs.

  Her back was smooth and bare, except for the bra strap that marred the picture. He unsnapped it, and in an instant she righted, her head connecting with his chin and knocking him backward into the controls.

  “Ohmygosh!” She cupped his face between her hands and massaged his chin. “Are you okay?”

  “Wh-what happened?”

  “You undid my bra and it kind of surprised me.”

  “Kind of?”

  She looked at him close. “I think you chipped a tooth.”

  He gazed at her, taking in her nakedness. He growled. “It was worth it.”

  Her breathing kicked up a notch. “Hurry?”

  He fumbled with the condom until she snatched it from his fingers, but didn’t have any better luck than he did until she tore it open with her teeth. She spit out a piece of foil. “Ta-da.”

  Then she unrolled it over the head of his erection. He gritted his teeth, fighting for control. “Hurry.” This time he said it.

  “You’re kind of big here, not that I’m complaining, but it’s like trying to put ten pounds of sugar into a five-pound sack.”

  Her eyes met his, and he laughed in spite of the heat eating at his insides.

  “Something my grandma used to say. Though knowing grandma, I don’t think this is exactly what she had in mind.”

  He snagged her around the middle and set her on the chair, his face level with hers. “I really want to kiss you again.”

  “We don’t have time.” She spread her legs until they connected with the armrests of the chair. “That’ll be good enough, right?”

  “If this is meant to drive all thoughts of sex from our brains, it’s got to be better than good, sugar.” He took her left foot and placed it on one side of the console, the right foot on the other side, opening her wide, caging himself between her legs. What a great place to be.

  Her eyes covered half her face, and she turned red as the parka she’d brought on board. “This is a little embarrassing. I’m spread wide open like a Christmas turkey, and you still have on your clothes.”

/>   He yanked off his shirt, his fingers trembling. He dropped the shirt to the floor. “That’s all the concession to my nakedness. You’ll have to deal.”

  His gaze never left her delectable body. The feel of her thighs on his now bare sides made blood rush like liquid fire in his veins. He touched the tiny ring at her navel, making her muscles quiver, his also. Her eyes darkened even more with arousal as he trailed his index finger from her navel to damp curls. He lingered a moment there, savoring the silky strands, then slipped beyond, separating her damp folds and grazing her swollen clit. She gasped and gripped his shoulder.

  “Ryan?” she rasped. “What are you doing? Just sex. No frills.”

  But he wanted more than just sex. He wanted to explore every inch of her, give her mind-boggling pleasure. Feel her wet and hot and delicious just for him. His fingers slid into her as she bit her bottom lip. “Do you like that?”

  “Oh, God, Ryan,” she whimpered in a breathy rush. “We don’t have ...” The rest of her words were lost as he pulled his finger out, then added another as he entered her again. Deeper this time, a bit faster, his hand pressing against her lush mound as he stroked her inside, making her tremble. The euphoric expression on her face nearly sent him over the edge.

  “Please,” she gasped, her tone pleading, her eyes glassy.

  He wanted nothing more than to make this last all night, take her slowly, make her whimper again and again with pleasure. No woman had ever responded so completely to his touch, and he didn’t want it to end so—

  “Ryan! The time?”

  “Fuck.”

  “Yes, I agree.”

  He took his fingers away and slid his erection into her, expanding her tight passage and realizing he’d never wanted a woman so desperately as he wanted Effie right at this moment. The scent of sex drenched the air. Harsh rays of sunset pierced through the cabin from one window to the other, and the astounding sensation of her tight body surrounding his drove him wild.

  He claimed her mouth as he slid partially out, then pushed farther into her with the next stroke. She moaned, then gasped, her mouth opening, knees bending back, giving herself completely to him, making every fiber of his body scream for release.