Keep Me Closer (A Dangerous Tides Novel)

by Rhyannon Byrd

  He was suddenly shaking with a fine tremor of emotion, and she could actually feel his fear. “Okay. All right,” she murmured, hoping to soothe him. “I get it, Alex. I’m not happy that you didn’t just tell me what had happened, because I hate being left in the dark. But I get it. I understand.”

  “Then lose the clothes for me,” he said in a low voice, jerking his chin toward her dress as he stepped back.

  With her hands pressed to her warm cheeks, Brit gaped at him. “Are you serious? You want to pull your caveman routine now?”

  “You heard me,” he said, reaching down to open his jeans. He had that look of intense determination in his eyes again, but she could have told him no if she wanted to. No matter how dominant he was, she knew he would always respect her choices. Even when he was in this possessive, over-the-top, alpha caveman mode.

  Not that she actually wanted to deny him. No, she just wanted as much of him as she could get. Wanted to glut on him throughout the night, knowing this was closing in hard and tight on the end.

  If it was going to be about nothing more than sex, then she wanted to get her heartbreak’s worth now, so that she could use the remembered pleasure to soothe her wounds later on.

  “All right,” she murmured, reaching behind her to undo the zipper, before sliding the straps of her dress over her shoulders. Then she reached back for the clasp on her bra.

  “Get on the table,” he told her, when her bra and panties had joined the yellow sundress on the floor.

  “What is it with you and tables?” she murmured, arching one of her brows at him as she hopped up on the table in the breakfast nook, sitting with her legs hanging over the edge.

  * * *

  ALEX GAVE HER A SLOW, HUNGRY SMILE. “I LIKE GETTING YOU ON ANY horizontal surface. Tables just tend to be close by,” he said, forcing her legs apart as he stepped between them. He told her to lie back, then ran his hands down the insides of her thighs and lifted her knees, opening her up completely as he pushed her knees down to the tabletop. “Oh, God, that’s so beautiful.” Grabbing her hands, he brought them between her legs. “Now hold it just like that for me. I want your pussy spread wide open.”

  She started shaking her head, but he leaned over her and caught her lips, kissing her hard and deep, his tongue sinking into her mouth. “Yes,” he breathed against her soft lips, flicking them with his tongue. “I need this, Doc. I need you to feel comfortable with me.”

  She trembled, but exhaled a long breath and allowed him to place her fingers where he wanted them. When he was done, her fingertips were pulling her outer labia wide, revealing all the juicy pink bits inside, her tender flesh already glistening with her lube.

  “Fuck, that’s perfect,” he groaned. “Just . . . hold it, don’t move.”

  “I’m—”

  “Do. Not. Fucking. Move. Brit.”

  She gave a breathless laugh. “Fine,” she huffed. “I won’t move.”

  “Christ,” he scraped out a moment later, running his tongue over the edge of his teeth as he drank in the stunning, provocative sight she made, all laid out before him like a gift. “I need to be inside you so badly, but I can’t stop staring at how fucking gorgeous you look.”

  She had a dark red, luxurious bush, trimmed up all nice and neat. And below that, a hot pink little cunt that contrasted sharply with the creamy paleness of her skin. It was so incredibly beautiful, and he honestly couldn’t seem to get enough of it. That wasn’t bullshit. Each time he had her, it didn’t matter how long or how hard he fucked her or tongued her, the hunger in his gut just grew more intense.

  Ripping his shirt off, Alex finally leaned down and started suckling her clit, determined to make her come so hard she forgot all about McNamara and Shepherd and any other bastard who wanted to mess with her life. Licking his way down to her vulva, he took her with his tongue like a man starved for the taste of his woman, plunging in and out of that sweet little hole while he shoved his jeans down over his hips.

  Unable to wait any longer, he ripped his mouth away from her, straightened, and notched his cockhead against her opening, more than ready to thrust deep and fuck the hell out of her. But then he . . . stopped. Lowering himself over her, Alex braced himself on his elbows and dropped his forehead to hers, his muscles twitching as he tried to make sense of the chaotic messages firing through his brain. She’d been through hell tonight, and the last thing she needed was to get nailed to the hard surface of the table. She deserved something soft and giving, and though it was probably going to kill him to wait, he forced his hips back.

  “Alex?”

  “Shh,” he whispered against her cheek, gathering her in his arms. “Put your legs around me, baby, and hold on.”

  He picked her up and carried her into the living room, snatching at the soft throw Reese had hung across the back of the sofa the last time she and Ben had been over. Thankful for it, he laid the blanket over the leather cushions. Something inside him felt compelled to make this as comfortable for Brit as possible, knowing she deserved to be treated like a fucking goddess.

  Lowering them both to the long sofa, he lifted her knee and pushed inside her voluptuous body. And, oh, Christ, that was so fucking perfect. For a moment, he couldn’t do anything but hang his head over hers, his eyes squeezed shut, biceps bulging as he braced his upper body on his arms. Then he slowly lowered himself against her, crushing her beautiful tits against his chest, buried his face in the warm, fragrant curve of her throat, and started to move.

  With his hips working between her shapely thighs, their heat-glazed bodies slipping and sliding, Alex placed his hands on her sides, then ran them over every silken inch of skin he could reach, soaking in every part of her. All the smooth, satiny curves. She was lushly feminine, the smell of her skin so good it made his mouth water, her taste even better when he parted his lips and licked her. He ran his tongue up the sensual column of her throat, fastening his lips around her earlobe and nipping it with his teeth.

  “It’s unreal,” he groaned, grinding himself against the hot, moist cushion of her pussy. “Nothing’s ever felt as right as being inside you. I fucking love it, Brit. Won’t ever get enough of it.”

  Whoa . . . Did he really just say that? What the hell was he thinking? That wasn’t . . . him. Not now. Not the man he’d become.

  Before she could respond, calling him on the crazy words, Alex pulled out, flipped her over, and pushed back in, fucking her hard and fast, his mouth all over her as he licked and nipped at her shoulders, trying to lose himself in the physical moment so that he didn’t have to think about . . . anything. She was tight as a fist, her sweet ass cushioning his hammering thrusts as he powered into her again and again, the wet, suctioning sounds filling the room, and it didn’t take long before they were both shaking and groaning with release, their bodies straining in a pleasure so violent and dark it nearly left them destroyed.

  As the fog slowly cleared from his brain, Alex braced himself on his arms and stared down at the trembling length of her back with a dawning sense of horror. There were red splotches on her hips from where he’d gripped her too tightly, the smooth skin on her shoulders and upper back covered with marks that he knew had been made by his stubble, and even his teeth.

  “Shit,” he grunted. “I was too rough.”

  “No. I’m good.” Her voice was deliciously husky, almost slurred with pleasure.

  He worked his jaw, then clenched it, his throat tight. “I left marks, Doc.”

  “Hmm.” The crazy woman actually sounded like she was smiling. “I’m sure I’ve left a few on you, as well. You didn’t hurt me, Alex. So stop worrying.”

  “You’re okay?”

  “I’m fine. I swear.”

  He dropped his head forward, eyes screwed tightly shut as he tried to make sense of the chaos going on inside him. He was too off balance, his insides churning, so twisted up in knots he had t
o grit his teeth to keep from groaning like a pussy.

  “I hate that guy,” he eventually muttered, trying to convince himself that her bastard of a boss was the reason why he couldn’t get his thoughts straight, since it was easier than facing the truth. And he really did despise the smarmy asshole.

  “Who?”

  “McNamara. I don’t want him coming anywhere near you.”

  She turned her face to the side, her cheek pressed against the soft throw, and he could see that her languorous gaze was focused on something distant as she said, “Alex, you know that you can trust me, right? I mean, I don’t know exactly what it is . . . what’s between us. I don’t know where your head is in all of this, but I’m not the kind of woman who sleeps with one man and flirts with another. I never have been, and I never would be.”

  “He wants you,” he forced from his tight throat, hating the way the words tasted in his mouth.

  “Maybe. I . . . I don’t know. I think he’s reeling from his divorce and trying to find his way through the fallout. But even if he does, it doesn’t matter. I’m not interested in him. I never have been.”

  “You weren’t interested in me, either,” he pointed out sourly.

  “If you really think that,” she said, and he could tell that she was trying not to laugh at him, “then I’m a better actress than I thought.”

  He took a deep breath as he carefully pulled himself from her body, then lifted her and turned her over. He searched her expression in the golden light spilling from the lamp at the end of the sofa. “What are you saying?”

  She lifted her gaze to his, looking at him through her lashes, her voice soft as she said, “I’m saying that I’ve been interested since I met you.”

  “No. You hated my guts.”

  Her lips twisted with something caught somewhere between a grin and a frown. “Not really. I hated that you didn’t support Ben when he met Reese, but I’ve never hated you. I just didn’t let on because it was pretty clear that you really weren’t interested in having anything to do with me.”

  He swallowed thickly, a strange buzzing in his ears as he heard himself say, “I wanted to fuck you the first time I ever set eyes on you.”

  Her eyes went wide and her jaw dropped. “Seriously?”

  “Oh, yeah.” He grinned a little. “I went home that night and had a hell of a fantasy about you while jacking off in the shower.”

  She laughed as she socked him in the shoulder. “Nice.”

  “Not nearly as nice as this,” he murmured, leaning down and pressing his lips to the sensitive place beneath her ear. Pulling in another deep breath, he felt something stunning and huge roll through him as he took in her familiar scent. Familiar. Christ, he’d been obsessed with that warm, womanly smell for months now, trying to get his fix whenever they were around each other without getting caught. It was ingrained in his system, a part of him, like tree roots digging their way deep into the earth, and the rightness of it was as shocking as it was terrifying.

  She wasn’t just some casual hookup. He knew her, damn it. Her laugh. Her smile. He respected her . . . was protective of her. Enjoyed her. And the more he had her, the more he wanted from her.

  Shit, he wanted so much he no longer even recognized himself, and in that moment, Alex understood exactly what had driven him so hard when he’d had her in Miami. Taking her away hadn’t only been about her safety. No, it had been his way of giving himself a chance to claim her outside of the life he’d made for himself in Moss Beach. Away from the man he’d become here. The one who didn’t commit or do relationships or let a woman mean anything to him other than a hard fuck.

  But it only worked when they’d existed in that alternate paradigm. Now that they were home, back in the “real” world, he didn’t know how to reconcile the man he’d been there with the one he was here. He didn’t even think it could be done.

  More importantly, he wasn’t even sure he wanted it to work. Not when he knew how destructive the fallout could be. Damn it, he’d learned his lesson. Learned that there were some things it was better to shy away from, before they tore you down so far you no longer even recognized yourself, than to take a chance on them.

  He couldn’t afford another hit. So he had better make sure he was prepared for what was coming. Which meant putting some distance between them when distance was needed.

  Pressing a kiss to her forehead, he moved to his feet and hiked up his jeans, buttoning them closed before heading into the kitchen and bringing back her dress. The scene was strangely reminiscent of Friday night, when he’d taken her in the dining room. It was like watching himself in motion from behind a wall of soundproof glass. No matter how hard he banged the shit out of that thing, he couldn’t reach the dumbass son of a bitch standing there getting ready to give her the brush-off again. She studied his closed expression as he handed the dress to her, and he figured she didn’t need to be a therapist to know that he’d just taken another wrong turn in his head.

  With a soft catch in her voice, she said, “I’m going to go and grab a shower. Want to join me?”

  “I would, but I need to get some work done. I’ll be up in a little while.”

  “All right.” She gave him a small, close-lipped smile that was clearly forced. He wouldn’t be surprised if she was already getting tired of his shit, and the thought made his chest feel like someone had just taken a hammer to it. He felt cold, but there was a trickle of sweat slipping down his spine, and he shook his head. What the fuck was wrong with him?

  “We still need to talk about what I’m doing about work this week, but we can do that in the morning,” Brit was saying as she smoothed her dress back over her beautiful body, her gaze focused on her task instead of him. “But I thought I could make dinner tomorrow night, so I’ll need to go by the store at some point.”

  He frowned. “You don’t need to cook. We can pick something up, like we did tonight.”

  “I can only eat so much fast food,” she said with a wry twist of her lips, shifting her gaze to his, “and it’s not a big deal. I like to cook when I’m at home.”

  He flinched before he could stop himself when she referred to his condo as home, and knew that she’d noticed. He instantly felt like a dick. Seriously, what the hell was he doing?

  He deserved to have his ass kicked, for acting like such a child, but she didn’t even call him on it. She just stood there for a moment, her luminous eyes swirling with emotion. So many he couldn’t quite catch them all. But the pity was coming through too loudly to miss, and he swallowed against the rise of bile in his throat.

  In a move that was becoming frustratingly familiar, she took a deep breath, then looked away from him and went upstairs to take her shower.

  And that time, she didn’t ask him to join her.

  14

  TWENTY-FOUR HOURS LATER, BRIT WAS STILL TRYING TO FIGURE OUT what was going on with Alex. He hadn’t touched her since the telling encounter on his sofa the day before. In fact, he’d barely even spoken to her. Instead, he was keeping himself busy in his home office, working in conjunction with Ben to locate Clay, while trying to keep up on his other cases.

  And he was doing a damn fine job of making her feel like she wasn’t even there.

  After what had happened with Clay on the road, Brit had decided that it was safer for everyone, especially her patients, if she took some personal time away from the office this week and stayed at home. Well, at the condo. Alex had one of Ben’s deputies bring her laptop over from her office, so she’d been able to stay busy with some work. But it’d still been a long, lonely day. When Reese had phoned to check on how she was doing that afternoon, she’d offered to come over and keep her company. Now, in the early evening, Brit found herself curled up in one of the chairs on Alex’s patio and pouring it all out to the petite brunette who had become one of her closest friends.

  “I think he’s just really w
orried about you,” Reese murmured, leaning forward to set her coffee mug on the small patio table that sat between them. “Ben said that when you guys got back last night, Alex started calling in every favor owed to him so that they can find Shepherd. I think the danger you’re in is driving him crazy.”

  “Maybe,” she said with a worried sigh. “Or maybe he’s just pulling back because we . . . I don’t know. Got too close or something.”

  “What exactly happened in Miami?” Reese asked, her tone curious as she lifted her feet onto the edge of her wicker chair and wrapped her arms around her knees. Her dark hair was shot with glints of gold from the Caribbean sun, the freckles sprinkled over her nose even more prominent than usual, making her look adorable. And she had that disgustingly happy glow that said she was completely and utterly in love. It was a good thing Brit liked her so much, or she would have been green with envy.

  She thought about Reese’s question for a moment, and then she said, “He’s always been so closemouthed about himself, but while we were away, he finally started opening up to me, telling me about his past. About his marriage to the bitch-face who cheated on him. Even about what happened with his career. And he was . . . I don’t know. More at ease. At times even playful. It just . . . it made everything between us seem so much deeper. I’m wondering if that freaked him out.”

  Reese nodded in understanding. “For a guy like Alex, what you two have going on is probably not only unfamiliar, but forbidden territory.”

  Brit frowned. “It’s fairly unfamiliar to me, too.”

  “But you’re a woman, which means you’re genetically programmed to handle the emotional stuff better than he is.”

  A quiet laugh fell from her lips. “God, that is so screwed up.”

  “Tell me about it.” With a smirk, Reese added, “But you’re the one with the psych degree, so you should already know this.”