“What are you doing?” she asked, pulling back and looking up at him with those big beautiful eyes of hers.
He cupped her backside. “Taking what we both want. I know I can’t keep pushing you for more. We only have this summer. We need to make the most of it. Besides, there is always the chance that this will burn out long before you have to leave.”
“Do you actually believe that?” she asked, licking her lower lip and watching him with a careful gaze.
She was complicated. He didn’t appreciate being reminded of that at this moment, when he wanted to focus on the physical. But there’d always been so much more than sex between the two of them.
He really didn’t know. He only knew that he wasn’t going to pretend he didn’t want her anymore. “It doesn’t matter. All that matters is this.”
He brought his head to hers again. She made a sweet moaning sound deep in her throat as she twined her arms around his neck and brought her body into full contact with his.
Her breasts rubbed against his chest, her thigh slipped between his and he rocked against her, letting her feel the effect she had on him. He was rock hard and ready to go off, but he knew this wasn’t the place. They needed to get out of here.
Yet when he had her in his arms, he didn’t want to let her go anywhere. Even though he was kissing her now, catching Meg was like trying to trap a firefly and keep it. He couldn’t. He knew that. What he shared with her was only going to last as long as she was pressed up against him, her mouth moving under his, her body writhing against his.
It was only when they were joined in passion that she’d stop letting fear dominate her. But as that thought flickered through his brain, he realized she wasn’t alone in that. Fear had become his driving force, too. Fear that he wouldn’t have a chance to fully explore the passion between them before she was gone.
He leaned against the trunk of the tree and pulled her against him. Her hands moved up over his chest. He ran his hands up under the hem of her T-shirt to touch her smooth skin. It was hot, like the day, like her, and he caressed every inch as he devoured her mouth.
“Rory? We need your help,” he heard J.J. call.
Rory cursed as Meg lifted her head from his and licked her lips. “You’d better go,” she said.
“I don’t want to,” he apologized. “But I have to. Meet me after my shift is over?”
“I will. The summer always seems endless, but we both know it will be over before long,” she said with that damned honesty of hers.
“Would it hurt you to tell a lie once in a while?” he asked. Then, with a grin, he adjusted himself in his shorts and turned to walk away. When he got back to the grill, he found Pat flipping wings over.
“You okay?”
“Just needed a break from the sun and the smoke.”
Pat raised an eyebrow. “Now, I know that’s not true. Firefighters live to breathe smoke.”
“We live to make sure other people don’t breathe too much of it,” Rory said. “I need a drink.”
“I’ll get you one. These wings smell great,” Pat said as he walked away.
Rory scanned the crowd and noticed that Meg was hanging out with her family. She waved at him when she caught him staring and he waved back but then shook his head.
It was time he gave up trying to pretend that she hadn’t already found her way into his heart. And when she left, she’d take it with her.
Chapter Eighteen
THE TWIN PALMS fireworks display wasn’t as big or grand as the ones she’d seen when she’d lived in New York City, but it certainly instilled the same feeling of patriotism. The high school band played as the sky lit up.
Meg sat on a blanket on the grassy lawn with her mom and sister. Rory had joined them for dinner, and Meg could tell that her family really liked him. He was a good guy. Something her mom couldn’t resist telling her . . . again and again.
She laughed and hugged her mom. It was no secret that her parents were anxious for her and Anne to settle down and give them grandkids to spoil.
“How does Rory feel about your ambitions?” her mom asked.
“Probably the same way I do about him being a firefighter.”
Her mom laughed. “I suppose you two will have to figure it out.”
Not really. She had a plan about what she was going to do about Rory. But when she was near him, it all went out the window. She could think of nothing else but being with him.
She’d been in love before—okay, that was a lie. She now knew that what she’d felt for Hollis hadn’t been love. Rory was the first man to ever dominate her thoughts all the time. He was the first man to make her question her decision to follow her dreams.
The first man . . . who could ever steal her heart.
She wanted to be with Rory, and that made her question everything else—leaving Twin Palms, leaving her family and leaving the big house that she sometimes found herself remodeling with herself and Rory in mind.
She sighed.
“Are you okay?” her mom asked.
“Yeah. Just thinking about the house. The kitchen was pretty easy because I’d been collecting ideas for a while. But the living room . . . that’s different.”
Her mom reached over and patted Meg’s hand. “You’ll do it, honey. You always do.”
Her mom made it sound easy. But things weren’t that simple.
“I don’t think that is what’s really bothering you,” she said.
“How did you deal with Dad’s job?” she asked, finally getting up the nerve. “Didn’t it scare you?”
“Is that why you are keeping steady to your plan to leave?” her mom asked.
“I think it is part of it. But I also have to prove to myself that I can do it. That all my earlier swagger and big talk wasn’t just hot air.”
“You have never been one to brag, Meg. I think that’s just your insecurity talking. As for your dad, I don’t know how I did it. I guess I just took everything one day at a time.” She paused. “Meg, if he’s a good man, that’s all that matters. I like Rory.”
“I do, too. But I sometimes worry that I might not be what he needs either,” Meg said. “He is happy enough to be with me, even knowing that it’s just for the summer. But I’m not sure he’s really looking for more. He’s been burned before. His ex-wife hated that he was a firefighter.”
“You know what might help you?”
“What?”
“Maybe you could do some training at the fire department. I used to go on ride-alongs with your dad, so I could see just what he did. It allowed me to remember just how important his job was.”
“Did it help?”
“A little,” her mom admitted.
“How did you guys make it work?”
“We both had to change. Your dad took a promotion that would keep him in the office, even though he wanted to stay in the field. And I, well, I just started to live for the moments I had and stopped making plans for the future.”
Meg nodded. “It sounds like a fair compromise.”
“You’ll find a way to make it work if it means that much to you. Even if you get your show, that doesn’t mean that you can’t have Rory, too. Long-distance relationships work for a lot of people.”
“But I’m not sure if that’s the life I want,” Meg admitted. Her mom had given up a lot to be with her dad and she seemed happy with those choices. Meg only hoped someday she could find the same kind of peace.
After the last of the fireworks were lit, she looked around for Rory and saw him standing in the shadows, watching her. He gave her a quick smile, then turned to laugh at something Pat said. He was more a part of her community now than she was.
“WHAT’S UP WITH you and Meg?” Pat asked. He’d been drinking with the guys, but they’d all left to go back to their wives an
d girlfriends.
“Nothing.”
“Yeah, right,” Pat said. “Listen I know it’s none of my business—”
“You’re right. It isn’t any of your business.”
“Yeah, but . . . she’s really good at what she does. You should see the way she’s thrown herself into redoing the house. The way she takes what’s there and makes it work again . . . I’m really impressed. She’s preserving the past, yet making it something totally new.”
“I’m not surprised. She re-did a fire alarm bell for me. It’s one of those big old cast iron ones that had more than likely had been rusting away before she rescued it.”
He was proud of Meg and her talents. And he understood what his brother was saying, in a very roundabout way—he shouldn’t stand in her way.
If he thought he could save himself—and her—some pain by walking away, he’d do it. But that wasn’t the answer. It never had been. They both were still too interested in each other.
He wished that knowing how badly she wanted to leave town would dampen his desire for her, but it didn’t. And it wasn’t even that he thought he could change her. He knew he couldn’t, and he didn’t want to. It was simply that, when he looked at Meg, nothing else seemed to matter.
It was, at the same time, the most powerful thing he’d ever experienced and the most dangerous. He left Pat without saying anything else and walked away from the families and the music. He needed to put some distance between himself and the community that Meg was so much a part of.
Everyone he met was connected to her in some way. But this was his town too, now. His brother was even talking about staying. For Rory, the main reason he liked Twin Palms so much was simply because of her. It was her hometown.
When Meg left, he’d still hear about what she was doing from her family, he’d see her face in Anne’s similar one and he’d never forget how she felt in his arms. So he had some decisions to make. There was no keeping the thing he wanted—his place in Twin Palms—if he let her go.
She was like a fire in his blood, and he knew that if he wanted any peace, this thing between them was going to have to burn out. Only he didn’t see that happening . . . Why couldn’t he have fallen for an uncomplicated woman?
“Rory? You okay?” Meg asked, coming up behind him. When he nodded, she called over his shoulder. “Great job on the fireworks, Pat.”
“Thank you, ma’am. I was just telling Rory about your work on the house.”
“I couldn’t do it without your help.”
“I’d love to see it sometime,” Rory said, realizing he was a little jealous that his brother was spending so much time with Meg. It was ridiculous, but there it was. He wanted to be the man she turned to for everything.
He had to manage this. Had to figure out a way to keep himself from falling deeper for her.
“I’ve got to go. I’m meeting that sweet waitress from the diner for drinks,” Pat said with a wink.
As his brother walked away, Rory looked over at Meg. She was backlit by the bonfire and the tiki torches which lined the grounds. At this moment, she could be anyone. That’s how shadowed her features were. And he wanted to close his eyes and pretend that he’d never been here before. That he’d never been hurt before. But it was too late for that.
“I’m still heading out to Daytona in the morning. Are you going home with your family?”
“I was hoping to go home with you, Rory. I’ve missed you.”
“Me, too,” he said quietly. Then he shook his head. “What am I going to do with you?”
“Don’t think about that. Let’s just enjoy this time with each other.”
He took a deep breath. Whatever he decided, this was probably his last night with Meg. And he couldn’t let her go, not without having her in his arms one last time.
He took her hand and led her to his motorcycle. He put his helmet on her and then they both climbed on the bike and drove to his house.
SHE KNEW THIS was where she needed to be tonight. In the background, she heard the sound of locals setting off fireworks, but all she could focus on was the beating of her heart. She had thought he was the broken one, but it felt now as if they both were. He opened his arms and she went into them. He held her close and their mouths met. For the first time, she wondered if she was running to something or just wanted to get away from the complications of her life, the decisions she didn’t want to make because she knew that living with the outcome would be hard.
He skimmed his hands down her back and cupped her backside the same way he had when they’d kissed under the willow tree. But this time, she felt his fingers under the hem of her shorts. His nail scraped over her skin and she shivered as she felt every nerve in her body go on high alert.
She licked her lips and then stepped back. He raised both eyebrows at her. “What are you doing?”
“You’ll see. Go sit down over there,” she said, gesturing to the big recliner that faced the glass doors. He did as she asked, and she followed him down. Then she straddled his big body and brought her mouth down on his.
She wanted all that he had to give, and this time she was taking control. She needed to make sure that he never forgot that he was hers. Was he hers?
Not wanting to think about that, she pushed his shirt up and off, then threw it on the floor. She ran her hands over the light covering of hair on his chest, rubbing the pad of her thumb over his flat nipples and then bent lower to drop kisses all over his chest.
He tangled his hands in her hair and then caressed her back, undoing the clasp of her bra. She shifted on his lap and met his cloudy blue gaze with her own. Then, in a brazen move, she pulled her shirt up over her head and tossed it aside.
As she shimmied out of her bra, she watched him and felt a surge of feminine power. He wanted her. Of that, she had no doubt.
He ran his hand over her exposed skin. Starting at her neck, he traced the line of her collarbone to her shoulder and slowly, lightly, moved his touch down her arm and up her torso. He tickled her belly button, then ran his fingertips over her ribs before cupping her breast.
“You’re so pretty.” Then, pulling her closer, he kissed the same path he’d just taken with his hands. As he slowly nibbled his way from her neck to her shoulder, he stopped to look up at her. Only, she didn’t like the emotion she saw in his eyes. She knew this was a mistake.
She’d known that being lonely and confused about where she was in her life was no excuse to allow him to get so close to her. He deserved a woman who could love him the way he deserved to be loved.
He put his hands under her armpits and lifted her up, setting her on her feet. Then he stood up, and, pulling her into his arms again, he carried her the short distance to the couch,
She felt his hands unfastening her shorts, pushing them down her legs, and she shifted until she was lying naked on top of him.
“That’s more like it,” he said, kissing in her in a way that made her forget about everything except the desire burning inside of her and the need to have him inside of her again.
She unfastened his pants, reaching inside to stroke him through the opening of his briefs and he shifted his hips so that she could push his pants off. Then, straddling him, she braced her hands on his shoulders and felt him slide inside. The moment was perfect. She felt like she’d come home . . . and that scared her more than anything else had in a long time.
She bit at his bottom lip, framing his face with her hands as she continued to kiss him, trying to take everything she could from him.
He shifted and entered her again and she groaned at the rightness of it. As she rocked against him, she knew she’d never find another man like Rory. And she’d never want to.
He pulled her close, forcing her to move faster. He pulled his mouth from hers, urging her toward her climax with raw, desperate words in her ea
r. She felt everything inside of her clench as her orgasm rushed through her. She called his name and felt him tighten his hands on her hips, pumping even harder and faster into her. Moments later, she felt his release wash over him and he emptied himself inside her. She collapsed against his chest.
Although they were both sweating, they clung to each other, knowing that this was goodbye. He deserved a chance to move on, and she didn’t want him to be the reason why she didn’t.
She had to sort out her own issues before she’d be free to follow her heart. There were decisions that had to be made. But maybe, down the road, they might find another way to make it work. Rory had already proven he was stronger than any other man she’d been with. A man who was able to handle her and her dreams.
Now she had to find the strength to do the same for him.
Chapter Nineteen
MEG WOKE UP when Rory’s alarm went off. It was five-thirty in the morning and he stretched his long arm over her to turn it off.
“Where do you have to be?” she asked.
“I’m heading to Daytona for the NASCAR race,” he reminded her. “Pat told me last night that you’d given him the time off to go.”
“I did,” she said. “I think he’s really looking forward to it.”
He rolled over her, propping himself up on his elbow as he looked down into her eyes. Her breath caught in her throat as she felt that same deep emotion that she was trying to pretend wasn’t love, pierce her.
“Please come with me,” he said.
“How badly do you want me to go?”
He rocked his hips against hers. “Pretty badly. I want to show you my old firehouse and let you meet my dad and brothers.”
She leaned up and kissed the scar on the bottom of his chin. “Okay, I’ll go. But I can’t stay away for too long. I have a lot of work to do while Pat is gone.”
In The Heat 0f The Night (The O'Roarkes Duet Book 2) Page 16