All I Need (Hearts of the South)

by Linda Winfree

  “You wanted me out of my suit and you got it.” He sat on the bed and pulled her down with him. “Maybe you should take me.”

  He was giving her control, and all that did was make her burn hotter.

  “Maybe I should.” She pushed him back, and he folded his arms behind his head, eyes on her as she slid her panties down her legs and crawled up him.

  “Nothing but pearls and heels on you,” he murmured, lifting one hand to stroke from her knee to thigh. He ran a fingertip along the string of pearls at her neck. “Damn deacons were so wrong.”

  “What are you talking about?” She leaned across him to grab a condom from her nightstand, and he took the opportunity to scrape his teeth along her nipple. Passion clenched hard between her legs. “God, Emmett.”

  He laughed, a dark sound deep in his throat, and moved his attentions to her other breast. “They were certain I wasn’t going to heaven, but I’m damn sure there.”

  She clutched the condom as he nipped once more, his fingers dipping between her legs to the wetness there. He plunged them inside her, and she cried out.

  “Wait.” She grasped his hair with her other hand, breathing hard to fight off a sudden climax. “I want to come with you inside me.”

  That dark laugh curled through her, right to where he touched her so intimately. “You’d better hurry then, sweetheart.”

  She grabbed his wrist and pushed his arm above his head. He was hard, erection pulsing against her thigh, and she sat back, gaze on his while she tore the wrapper open with exquisite care.

  His eyes burned. “You are such a damn tease.”

  She pulled the latex free and dangled it above him. “You love it.”

  “I do.” Something soft and sweet twined with the hoarse desire in his voice. She stretched the sheath down over him, abrading both palms down him, and he shifted his hips, a half-laugh, half-yell escaping his throat. “Damn it, Savannah.”

  “What, Em? Too much?” She reached for his hands above his head and lifted her hips over his, only to lower onto him with the same care she’d given the wrapper. He thrust up to meet her.

  “Never.” He turned his head, his mouth caressing the inside of her elbow while she took him, sliding up and down on his hardness. “I could never get too much of you.”

  There was that quiet note she couldn’t quite decipher. She closed her eyes, lost in the sensation of having him inside her, of the sweet hit of pleasure she took every time she went all the way down and the base of him pressed against her clitoris.

  “Savannah.” He fought one hand free of her easy hold and pushed tangled hair away from her face. He thrust harder under her. “Open your eyes. Look at me.”

  She lifted heavy lashes to find his gaze dark with desperate desire. Tension tightened between them, so she almost hurt with it. He tangled his hand in her hair and dragged her lips down, his tongue invading her mouth the way he took her body. On a harsh groan, he grasped her ass cheek with his other hand, using the leverage to push even deeper inside her. With a gasping moan, she came hard, with his tongue silencing her cry and him so hard and deep inside her she didn’t know where they were separated. He slammed up inside her again, pushing the climax into unbearable intensity, and he cried out into her mouth, swelling and pulsing within her.

  She collapsed into him, face buried in his throat, eyes squeezed closed against a flow of stupid tears. A physiological response to extreme release. Nothing more. She breathed hard, trying to get oxygen into her system. His chest heaved under her, and he pressed her head against him. Tension strained in him a moment, then he relaxed under her. One arm wrapped around her, he kissed her temple, a gentle, barely-there caress that brought renewed tears to her eyes.

  She needed to say something, anything, to break the emotion binding them together, but damn it, if she opened her mouth, she was going to cry for real.

  And she wasn’t going to look at that, wasn’t going to think about what that meant. Instead, she kept her eyes closed and let him hold her.

  Chapter Thirteen

  She wasn’t quite used to waking up with Emmett in her bed, but she liked it. Savannah stretched against him, a distinctly feminine soreness between her thighs, and rubbed her foot over his ankle.

  “Hey.” His drowsy greeting rumbled under her ear. “Morning.”

  “Hmm.” She kissed his clavicle and flexed her hands at his waist. “What time is it?”

  He rotated his wrist to squint at his watch. “About ten minutes until we have to get up.”

  A giggle built in her throat. “Wonder what we could actually accomplish in ten minutes.”

  “I can do a lot in ten minutes.” He rolled so she was beneath him, thighs hugging his hips. He pressed against her, morning erection sliding along her labia. “Let me show you.”

  He kissed his way down her sternum, lips tickling over her abdomen, and buried his nose in the curls at the junction of her thighs. Anticipation curled in her lower belly as he shifted her thighs further apart with his shoulder. A gentle touch of his tongue to her clitoris almost did her in.

  “Who’s a tease?” She tangled her fingers in the thick strands of his hair, and he laughed, the sound a sexy throb against her. He closed his mouth on her, tongue flicking, and he entered her with a pair of fingers. She bowed into him, the tension building quickly under his determined attention, and soon she called his name on a sharp climax.

  A hand on either side of her hips, he did a pushup, crawled up the bed, and collapsed against the pillow. He looked at his watch. “Six minutes. Hell, I’m good.”

  Boneless with the aftereffects of a shattering orgasm, she crowed with laughter and elbowed him in the abs. “Arrogant.”

  He chuckled and pulled her to him. “Don’t hear you complaining.”

  “No.” She relaxed into him, trailing her fingers up and down the center of his abdomen. She tickled the area right above his pubic hair. “Maybe we should compare time trials.”

  “You’d win. I last, what, two minutes when you put your mouth on me?”

  “I have a little bit of an advantage.” She smiled against his pecs and ran her hand down to cup his scrotum, pressing a finger against his perineum so he groaned. “I’m good at anatomy, remember?”

  “You’re good at lots of stuff.” He glanced at his watch again. “You have three and a half minutes until the alarm goes off.”

  It only took her two minutes, forty seconds. Knowing the exact location of the prostate gland was a help sometimes.

  “Dear Lord.” Winded, he pressed a wrist against his eyes. “You cheat.”

  “You benefit, though.” She smacked his hip with a light hand and reached to disable the alarm before it rang.

  “Boy, do I.”

  “Come on.” She grabbed his hand and pulled him from the bed. “Shower or we’ll both be late for work.”

  Afterward, she pulled on scrubs while he donned the uniform he’d hung in her closet after his last trip to the cleaners. All his gear was next door at his place, but she got a secret kick out of seeing some of his things hanging in her closet.

  She wasn’t going to look at that too closely.

  “Definitely has to go to the cleaners.” He tossed his suit jacket and shirt on the foot of her bed and fished his cell from the jacket pocket. Shoulders going rigid, he stared down at the phone screen.

  A frisson of unease moved through Savannah at the hard, tight expression on his face. “Everything okay? Landra all right?”

  “Yeah.” He swiped through a couple of screens and tapped the glass twice. “Everything’s good.”

  The stress roughening his voice told her not to pursue the point. She slipped on her shoes. “Anything special on your agenda today?”

  “Doctor’s appointment at ten for Delk to take a look at my leg.” He smiled at her, the expression doing little to dispel the tension keeping his jaw taut. “And the doc I’m sleeping with said something about blood tests.”

  “Run by when you’re done at Delk’
s office. We can do it then.”

  “I’ve got to go get my gear.” He crossed to drop a hard kiss on her mouth, and she tasted anger in the caress. “I’ll see you later. Have a good day.”

  “You too.”

  With one last kiss, he strode down the hall, and moments later, the door closed behind him. Savannah ran a thumb over her lips. What was going on with him?

  * * * * *

  Fury pulsed in his ears, and he restrained himself from slamming his front door. He shouldn’t even let it get under his skin, but simply seeing the voicemail icon from his dad skyrocketed his blood pressure.

  The son of a bitch had nothing to say that Emmett wanted or needed to hear.

  “About time you came dragging in.” Coffee mug in hand, Landra wandered in from the kitchen. She jabbed his arm on the way by. “Bet I don’t have to guess where you’ve been.”

  “Don’t start.” She’d been ragging him the past few days about Savannah. He’d ignored it for the most part because she was always trying to horn in on his life and because it wasn’t the right time to fight that battle, not when her own life was in shambles. “I’m not in the mood.”

  “Ah, a little trouble in paradise?” Landra settled on the couch and lifted her mug in his direction. “Problems with the good doctor?”

  “No. She is not the problem.” At his desk, he whipped his belt through his loops and snapped on his holster and cuffs holder. He reminded himself that beneath the nagging and probing lay sisterly love and concern, even if she was making him nuts. He’d missed her the last year, so maybe he’d just be grateful she was here and safe and acting normal with him. “Don’t you have anything better to do than give me a hard time about something that’s none of your business?”

  “You are my business.”

  “Landra, you’ve got to learn to stay out of my personal life. Besides, you have enough—” His phone vibrated to life in his pocket and he glanced at the screen. “Fuck.”

  He would not throw the offending object across the room.

  “What is wrong with you?”

  “Nothing.” He silenced the phone and shoved it in his pocket. She would understand if he told her, but he didn’t want her to worry about anything more than she already was. “I’ll see you later.”

  If he ignored the calls and voicemails, maybe sooner or later his father would get the message.

  * * * * *

  “Mills.” Mackey propped his hips against the desk and passed her a cup of coffee. “Better fuel up while there’s an opportunity.”

  She took one sip of the dark liquid and set it aside. No telling how old it was—someone had probably run it before she’d dealt with the abscessed splinter, the forty-year-old male in V-fib and the guy with a toothache who couldn’t understand why she wouldn’t write him a prescription for Percocet. Mackey had matched her with a pregnant patient presenting with early labor pains, an infant with a high fever, and an elderly man with nonlocalized pain.

  Mouth set, Mackey tapped a finger against the side of the counter. “You ever hear anything about our nursing numbers?”

  “We’re getting two more per shift. HR is going through resumes and interviewing. They’re adding on a CNA per shift as well.”

  The tension around his mouth gave enough to resemble a smile. “That’ll help.”

  “It’s a start.”

  “Block his number or quit bitching.” Clark Dempsey’s quiet voice drifted down the hall behind them. “Remember the prodigal son? Maybe this is the same, just in reverse.”

  “This is not the same.” Emmett’s voice sent prickles of awareness over her. His words still held the same tension she’d detected earlier, and she frowned. “The prodigal son left home once. You know how many times this is?”

  “Yes, I know how many, because you gripe to me each and every time.” Clark dropped his clipboard on the counter next to Mackey. “Remember…seventy times seven, my friend.”

  “You’re supposed to be on my side.” On the other side of Clark, Emmett rested his forearms on the countertop, hands clasped loosely before him.

  “I am on your side. An unforgiving attitude eats a person up. You don’t like my advice, go ask someone else.”

  Mackey sipped at his coffee and pulled out his phone, gaze on the screen. “Your dad again?”

  “Yep.” The terse syllable spoke volumes. She’d bet her next paycheck that’s what had set him off this morning.

  Savannah decided to change the subject. She looked around the two men between her and Emmett, her gaze on his tense features. “How did your appointment go?”

  “Okay.” He took a deep breath, as though trying to shed some of the stress. “Delk cleared me for duty part-time. I’m supposed to talk to Calvert this afternoon. And I can run, bike, just about everything except work out with the rope. I think she’s afraid I’ll trip over it. Well, and no basketball for another month.”

  Mackey snorted. “Because she knows how you play.”

  She smiled, watching some of the tightness in his face ease away with the change of topic. “That’s great.”

  “Speaking of Delk…” Brows raised, Mackey slanted a questioning look at Emmett. Clark dropped his attention to his clipboard, where he was filling out a report. “They’re sending your blood samples over here. I’ll call you later with your results.”

  “Thanks.” Emmett nodded at him, then shifted his attention to Savannah. “Have you got a minute?”

  “Sure.” She met Mackey’s suddenly knowing gaze. “I’m going to find a real cup of coffee. I’ll be back in ten. Page if you need me.”

  “Sure thing.” Laughter hovered in his voice.

  On the way down the hall to the cafeteria, Savannah scowled. “It’s impossible to have a private personal life in this town, isn’t it?”

  “Honey, you have no idea. You were definitely right about our being seen together. All the rumors I’m hearing now don’t have a damn thing to do with me and Lacey.”

  “That is ridiculous.” She decided not to acknowledge the little twinge that “me and Lacey” created. A pair of floor nurses passed them along the way, and she caught the curious glances they cast in her and Emmett’s direction.

  She looked up at him in time to catch a pensive expression flitting across his face. “How’s Landra this morning?”

  “A total pain in my ass.” Affection lightened the words, and he shrugged. “She’s…I don’t know. Being in limbo is hard, and that’s where she is. Her lawyer says Frank is going to sign off on all the papers, but that doesn’t mean anything is over yet.”

  In the cafeteria, they each poured coffee, and she swiped her employee badge to get them through the checkout line more quickly. Sunshine and relative privacy beckoned them to the small patio right off the cafeteria dining area. Rolling his cup between his palms, he propped against the low brick wall. Muscles flexed in his forearms with the movement, and she followed the flexion with her gaze, remembering those same muscles under her hands the night before. That memory, coupled with the lingering ache between her legs, sparked a little curl of wanting, mixed with a hint of melancholy.

  He was more intense than he appeared on the surface, and he brought that intensity to their lovemaking. Being with Gates had been easy and effortless, a natural outflow of their meshed personalities. It had been simple and wonderful, but nothing like the complexity and force of being with Emmett. The realization brought a hint of guilt with it. Why did that reality make her feel disloyal? Emmett wasn’t replacing Gates. He was making his own way in her life.

  Silence lingered between them a moment, and she could sense some of his earlier tension falling away. That strain she now saw was sparked by some interaction with his father, and while his reluctance to talk about it with her stung, she was glad he had an outlet, that he trusted Clark enough to confide in him.

  Apparently, he trusted Mackey enough that the physician had some of the details of their father-son relationship as well. Or maybe Mackey had been privy to that
relationship while he’d been with Landra. It did not bother her that everyone knew him better than she did.

  She covered that whopper with a sip of rich coffee.

  This was what it meant to want him laid bare with her. She had that openness in bed with him, but not emotionally. Even admitting she might want that scared the hell out of her.

  She really needed to talk to Amy. The parallel of her desire to confide in her sister about him, while he confided in Clark, wasn’t lost on her. They’d become lovers, but they still had at least one wall between them—a big one with trust written all over it.

  He set his coffee aside on the wall. “Don’t freak out, okay?”

  That didn’t bode well for anything he was going to say. “I’m sorry?”

  His hands tightened on the edge of the wall, and he watched her with a shuttered gaze. “I found out this morning that the house next to Clark’s, which I’ve wanted forever, is up for lease with an option to buy. I’ll never get a mortgage right now with the recent job change, but I can swing the lease and then exercise the option to buy in six months or so. Landra and I talked about her possibly keeping my apartment. I’m going to look at it this evening, and I want you to come with me.”

  “Why do you want me to come with you?”

  “I know we’re doing this day by day, but if I’m leasing a house with the intent of buying it, and I am, it makes sense that if we end up in this long term for real that you like it, too. I want your opinion.”

  This was huge. The last time she’d looked at houses with a man, she and Gates had been picking out the home they’d planned to live their married life in.

  But Gates was gone, and the man before her was brightening each of her days. She breathed through the sudden sense of panic. They only had to do today, and apparently, today involved looking at a house. Looking. Not making any long-term plans.

  It wasn’t like she was moving in with him.

  She nodded on a long, slow exhale. “Okay.”

  A smile creased his face, lighting his eyes, dispelling some of the tension he carried with him over those phone calls from his dad. “Great. Then dinner at Clark’s all right with you? Bennett and your sister are going. Probably Troy Lee and Angel. Maybe Nikki Pantone from the EMS station. Tried to get Landra to come along, but no luck.”