by Andrews, Amy
“Fuuucck!” she groaned, her head falling back against the door, her nails digging into his back. “You feel so good,” she gasped.
Doyle buried his head in the crook of her neck. She felt like hot velvet, and he wanted to stay high and hard inside her, just like this forever. But the pound in his chest and the beat in his blood were already demanding more, demanding that he take this to its inevitable conclusion.
“More where that came from,” he muttered and he slid out and slid in again—a little harder this time, a little higher.
Her fingers dug into his back a little deeper. “Oh, dear God, yes,” she gasped. “Yes. Don’t stop.”
Doyle didn’t. His hips set a rhythm his body had no control over as he pumped and pumped, pushing her higher and higher, her breasts swinging in his face. He feasted on them too, sucking and fucking, their bodies moving as one until he didn’t know where he stopped and she started.
Only that the tension and pleasure were mounting and spiraling together, twisting hard, pulling tight like strands of a rope, winding around and around each other, then suddenly releasing, Sal crying out his name, him crying out hers as everything unspooled, spinning them wildly round and round, flinging them out dizzily from each other, then winding them back in before spinning them out again.
Like they were flying.
Doyle was still breathing heavily when he came back down to earth, his forehead resting on her collarbone, his ear pressed to the slowly steadying rhythm of her heart. He didn’t know what had possessed him, but something had. That was no slow, gentle coming together. No first-date sweetness. It had been hard. Urgent. Hell…almost rough. Sure, it wasn’t the first time they’d been together, but taking her up against a door had not been on his agenda tonight.
“I’m sorry,” he said into her neck. “I didn’t mean to—”
Her head lolled off the door. “Shh,” she said, one hand finding his hair and stroking it, the other pressing briefly against his mouth, then slipping away bonelessly. “Don’t. It was perfect.”
Doyle gave a half laugh. She was right—hard and urgent could still be perfect. He felt like he’d been taken apart and reconstructed. “I didn’t even use a condom.”
“It’s fine…on the pill,” she murmured, the lazy stroke of her hand skittering goose bumps down his back. “Take me to bed, Doyle,” she murmured, hugging his head to her chest and tightening her legs around his waist.
Doyle, warmed by her request and still reasonably hard considering he’d come enough for two men, didn’t need to be asked twice. Staying buried inside her, he reached over to flick off the nearby light switch, plunging the room into darkness. He made a direct line for the bed, pulling out of her as he lowered her to the mattress, kicking out of his shoes and the rest of his clothes, relieving her of her shoes and top as well, then joining her, his heart expanding when she snuggled right into him like a…lover, a…girlfriend, her hand flat and possessive on his belly, her top thigh draped over his as they drifted off to sleep.
…
Doyle wasn’t sure how long he’d been asleep when he woke to a throbbing hard-on and a busy hand. “The things you do to me, woman,” he said, his eyes still closed, enjoying the low buzz of pleasure.
“Not my fault,” she protested with a smile in her voice. “This is the way I found it. I was just…encouraging it.”
“Trust me,” he said, “that is one piece of my anatomy that doesn’t need any encouragement.”
“Okay, I’ll stop, then,” she murmured, lifting her hand.
“Don’t you dare,” Doyle said, grabbing her hand and pressing it back again.
He turned to look at her, but she was already up and over, straddling him, seating herself on the top of his thighs as she tore open a condom packet with her teeth. There was adequate light from the high window above the bed to fully appreciate her nakedness.
“God,” he said, lifting his hand to the ripe swells of her breasts, “you’re beautiful.”
She shut her eyes for a moment and moaned, obviously enjoying the brush of his thumbs over the hardening tips of her nipples. Then she opened them again, rolling the condom down the length of him, and before he knew it, she was sinking down on him.
He reached for her breasts again, but she slapped his hands away. “Nuh-uh,” she whispered. “Lie back. Watch. Enjoy.”
And he did, his hands falling to her hips, watching as her belly undulated seductively, her faded scar a silvery line bisecting her lower abdomen in the ambient light. She changed tack then, rotating her hips in a slow, teasing movement as her fingers slid into the wet furrow between her legs, rubbing in time. Her breasts bounced as she slowly worked herself on and off him, increasing the speed as she went until he couldn’t stand not joining her, meeting every downward movement of hers with an upward one of his, her fingers frantic on her clit as she started to come apart, crying out, keening her release as it came over her.
The sight of her getting off on him was all Doyle needed to fall over the edge, too, thrusting into her, his hands clamping hard on her hips as it boiled out of him, pleasure and pain, groaning his release, bucking and bucking until he was spent and she collapsed against him and they slept again.
…
Sal woke to the early-morning light filtering in through the window, falling gently against their entwined limbs sans covers. Doyle had wrapped himself around her and it felt…good.
Last night had been good. Surprisingly good.
Not just the sex—although that had been spectacular—but the connection she’d felt with Doyle. Then and now. She’d tried to keep it all about the sex between them, but she’d known somewhere deep in her heart there was more.
Last time she’d spent the night in his bed, it had taken about one minute for the panic to set in, but there was no such feeling on the horizon this morning. She felt strangely…content. And cherished. And, surprisingly, protected as only being with a big, strong man could make a woman feel. It wasn’t very feminist of her, but it was there nevertheless.
And it wasn’t unsettling.
She’d missed it, she realized. Missed being with a man like this. Missed wanting to stay wrapped up in a man all night.
Two days away from the anniversary of one of the most devastating days in her entire existence and she felt so…calm. It felt good to not be a walking wreck—faking it on the outside, breaking on the inside. For so long, the lead-up to the anniversary was marked with nightmares, insomnia, and the overwhelming sense of loss that just didn’t seem to ease no matter how much time had elapsed. She was usually so frantic this time of year, racing around trying to cram as much into her life as possible. Working late, volunteering everywhere, dating and partying like the world was about to end.
But with Doyle here burrowing slowly under her skin over these past months, things were different. Maybe that meant way more than she’d been allowing herself to believe. Maybe it was about more than sex.
Maybe he’s the one?
A thought that wasn’t anywhere near as terrifying as it had been.
She smiled as red-hot memories from last night drifted through her head and she snuggled back into him, wondering how long it would take him to get with the program if she just wiggled around a bit.
“You are a temptress.” Lips buzzed her shoulder blade, and his raspy morning voice went straight to her nipples.
“Oh goody, you’re up,” she smiled.
“In more ways than one,” he muttered, the hard length of his erection nestled between her butt cheeks.
Sal turned her head, seeking his lips, rolling onto her back as their mouths joined in a kiss that had them both breathing hard in a matter of seconds. Doyle’s fingers stroked down her body. They brushed over her nipples, and she arched her back, then down her stomach, and she shivered. They swirled around her belly button, dipping in and out before caressing up and down the line of her scar.
He pulled out of the kiss, his breath husky as he dropped light kisses on her e
yes, nose, cheeks, and forehead, soothing her, settling them both. Eventually he looked down at the smooth flat line. “Will you tell me about the accident?”
Surprisingly, the usual denial didn’t form on Sal’s lips. When he’d probed her about her past that night at the clinic with Boxer, she’d shut him down because she didn’t talk about the accident to anybody. Others knew about it, of course—her parents, Mack, Josie, her psychologist. Gemma knew a bit; some of their long-term clients like Mrs. Carney knew a little. But Sal didn’t believe in airing her grievances—she held that stuff close.
Except suddenly she didn’t want to anymore.
Sal looked up into his face, her fingers lifting to trace the whiskery cleft in his chin and the high slope of his cheekbones. He was looking at her with softness, gentleness, and something else she couldn’t quite define as she weighed up her options. She could end it here—lift her head and kiss him, whisper something hot and dirty he couldn’t resist. The hard press of his erection along her thigh told her it wouldn’t take much.
Or she could bare her soul to him—tell him all the horrifying details. Maybe if he knew, he’d understand just how broken she was.
Understand why she was the way she was…
“It was bad, wasn’t it?” he asked, his voice low, his gaze compassionate.
She swallowed against the sudden block of emotion in her throat. “Yes.”
“How long ago?”
“Fi…six years. In two days it’ll be six years.”
She dragged her eyes off his face and turned on her side, pulling his arm with her as they settled into a spooning position, his legs tucked in behind hers, his hand resting flat on her belly right over her scar. Telling him was one thing. Looking at him while she did it was another.
“It happened out bush, in the middle of nowhere, coming back from a week away, driving home in the middle of the night. A truck driver ran a stop sign and T-boned the car. It flipped twice. It was an hour before anybody even happened across the accident.”
Doyle was lying very still, barely breathing, like he was afraid she’d scare and change her mind. But she’d come this far…
“Were there any casualties?”
Sal nodded. “The truck driver died at the scene. Also…Ben, my husband, was killed on impact.”
Doyle tensed around her. “Your husband? But…you were so young.”
“Yes, we were. He was my high school sweetheart, and we’d both known for a long time that we’d get married.” The tension in his body ramped up, but Sal refused to be deterred. She plowed on, wanting—needing—suddenly to tell him. To unburden. “I was trapped, pinned in by the steering wheel column.”
“Your legs?”
“No, no injuries to them, but I was…” Sal shut her eyes, took a deep breath. “Eight months pregnant at the time. The baby…she died.”
“God…I’m sorry,” he said, his palm flat and hot against her scar. “I had no idea.”
“It’s okay,” Sal dismissed. “Not many people do.”
He didn’t say anything for long moments, just cradled her belly. “It’s a C-section scar.”
Sal nodded. “Yes.”
“Not the usual incision site?”
“No. The impact caused a partial placental abruption and because it was so long before any medical attention arrived, I’d lost a lot of blood. It was all a bit of a mess inside. They had to do a vertical incision.”
“It’s a wonder you didn’t bleed to death.”
“It was a close call,” she said, remembering how profoundly shocked she’d been when help finally arrived on scene, almost unconscious, her blood pressure barely recordable. And for so long after, a part of her wished she’d died that night, too. Died in that car with her family. Lying here with Doyle now, feeling alive, getting it all off her chest, she was infinitely pleased she hadn’t.
“Were you conscious?”
“Oh, yes,” she said, the bitter taste of that experience, of those memories, still hard to bear. “I slipped in and out at the end, but I essentially had a ringside seat in full Technicolor.”
He kissed her shoulder, bussing his whiskers along the blade. “That must have been …awful.”
“Yep,” she whispered. “It was. Ben was… There was so much blood running down his face. And I couldn’t do anything but watch it slowly congeal and he was looking at me, his eyes were…open but not…focused and I knew he was…dead. I couldn’t even reach him to shut his eyes.”
“And that’s why you find it hard to sleep sometimes?”
She nodded. “Yes.”
“Nightmares?”
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry.”
Sal shut her eyes as they filled with tears. She was, too.
Doyle kissed her shoulder again and pulled her even closer, his head full of the things Sal had told him. Things he’d wanted to know since the beginning, things that were way worse than what he’d imagined. He’d always assumed it was a messy breakup with a boyfriend that made her determined to be the one who called the shots. Maybe even an abusive relationship. But not this.
Not profound loss and grief.
He couldn’t bear the thought of the horror she’d been through. Losing her husband and unborn baby. Almost dying herself?
So much about her made sense now. The way she was all bossy and brisk, keeping him at a distance. The way she’d been at the school that day, melting down with all those kids around and then not being able to return Harry’s enthusiastic hug. The way she used sex to forget, like a weapon guarding her heart. That hard shell of hers obviously hid a huge kernel of hurt.
And who was he to judge how she coped with that?
The fact that she was any kind of functional was amazing.
He was conscious of the scar beneath his palm. To her it no doubt represented loss and pain and grief. But to him, it represented her survival, her fighting spirit. She’d been near death, but somehow she’d pulled through.
Knowing how determined and bloody-minded she could be, Doyle wasn’t surprised.
His brave, brave Sal. She was so much more courageous than even he’d guessed at.
A surge of scalding-hot emotion filled up his chest, aching and burning. Prior to today, he’d been able to compartmentalize his feelings for Sal. He liked her as a vet, he desired her as a woman, he admired her for her sense of community and how she cared for her staff and those around her. How she’d stepped up for Harry when it must have been so hard had been above and beyond.
But lying with her in the aftermath of her admissions, her tragedies bared to him, the walls of the compartments broke down and they all blended together into one giant puddle of emotion. He could no longer hide from the truth by spreading his feelings around, pretending that a little bit in each compartment didn’t add up to anything. Because that was bullshit.
He didn’t have a crush. He wasn’t some kid with stars in his eyes. He knew what love was. He’d seen it in action growing up and known deep in his bones that one day it would be his turn. He’d had a pretty good time looking for it. Lots of false leads that had been fun—some that hadn’t. But he didn’t doubt for a second that his search was over. That he loved this incredibly strong and resilient woman lying in his arms.
Loved her and needed her.
But that was an admission for another day. He’d been with her long enough to know that, for Sal, the leap from sex to love was huge, particularly when he was competing with the memory of someone she’d once loved with all her heart. That he’d have to take it slow. Yes, she’d opened up to him. Yes, that gave him hope. But Sal Kennedy had been through a lot and built a lot of walls. She deserved to be treated with kid gloves.
He couldn’t take the horror of that night away from her, a bloodied Ben looking at her with lifeless eyes, her baby dead inside her. He couldn’t fix that. But he could be here for her now and hope that eventually it would be enough.
“Did she have a name?” he asked into the silence.
&n
bsp; “We were arguing about a name,” she said after a while, her voice muffled with emotion. “Ben liked Zelda. Zel for short. I didn’t like it at all but I couldn’t decide either…I liked about a dozen other names. I bargained with Ben that night, if he’d just wake up…look at me properly, I’d agree to Zelda.”
Her voice sounded thick, and Doyle held her tighter, snuggled in closer. He couldn’t even begin to imagine how horrifying it must have been for her, sitting next to her dead husband and not being able to do a thing about it.
“She’s Zelda on her birth certificate,” she said eventually.
Doyle buzzed his lips along her shoulder blade. He didn’t know what to say to make anything better for her. What could you say? “I like it.”
“So do I.”
He dropped a string of kisses along her nape. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’m so sorry. I wish I could take it all away for you.”
She turned in his arms then, her cheeks damp, her eyes bright with unshed tears. “You can,” she said. “I know exactly how you can take it all away.”
And then she pressed her body against his and her mouth against his and Doyle kissed her hard and deep and long.
This he could do.
Chapter Fifteen
Anniversary day dawned bright and clear. Perfectly innocuous. Just another day for everyone else, but the day for Sal.
D-Day.
Except she woke up in Doyle’s arms after a long night of lovemaking, and for the first time in six years, she felt like she could do it. That she could get through this day—this heinous, god-awful day—and come out okay at the other end.
That maybe she could even be whole again one day. Truly whole. Not just functioning.
That she could actually be happy.
Mack and Josie rang, fretting and concerned, and it surprised her as much as them to be able to assure them that she was doing okay. If they were curious about it, they didn’t ask, their relief palpable at the normality in her voice.
She could tell Doyle was hesitant as to what he should do. What his role was on such a big day. How he could help ease things for her. He offered to step back, get out of her hair for the night, stay in with her, or take her out—whatever she wanted. It was very sweet and she appreciated his thoughtfulness, given how she’d been with him in the past and the things he now knew about her.