by Bella Andre
The raft flew over the water into the wall of tree limbs and rocks, and he knew that if he didn’t get to her soon, she’d smash into it as well. Swimming hard across the current, he jammed his knee into a rock and barely flinched.
Where the hell is she?
He couldn’t see her head or hair above the white water and a thousand agonizing images flashed through his brain.
Finally, Dianna’s head rose out of the white foam. Ignoring the burning in his arms and legs and lungs, Sam heaved himself through the water and reached for her. He had almost grabbed her shirt, almost grabbed her arms, when she sank beneath the surface of the water.
CHAPTER TWELVE
DIANNA RELAXED into the wonderful dream.
She was floating and felt warm all over. And then suddenly there were big hands pulling and shoving at her and she was fighting them, trying to get back to that sleepy place. But the hands were stronger and they dragged her up through thick, wet foam.
Cold air slapped against her cheeks and she started coughing and choking.
Oh God, she finally realized, I was drowning.
Sam had saved her life.
He cradled her against his chest on the riverbank, and as she gasped in air, trying to refill her empty lungs with oxygen, he removed her helmet and gently ran his fingers lightly over the goose egg on her forehead.
“You hit your head pretty hard on a rock,” he said, his voice warm and soothing as its low tones swam through her. “It’s probably going to bruise.”
As she got her bearings back in Sam’s arms and the initial shock of being thrown out of the raft receded, it suddenly hit her that there could be far bigger problems ahead than healing from a bruise.
“Did we lose the raft?”
“Fortunately, no. It’s up ahead, jammed between a couple of tree trunks. It’ll stay there until we get it out.”
Relief flooded her that all was not lost and she knew she needed to push past the throbbing in her head and sit up. But even though remaining this close to her biggest temptation was a very bad idea, she couldn’t bring herself to move out of his arms.
For the first time in a very long time she felt safe.
Comforted.
With gentle fingers, he massaged her sore shoulder muscles, grown tight from endless paddling.
Did he know that his touch made her heart race?
That even without touching an erogenous zone, she was getting hopelessly aroused?
“I shouldn’t have let you leave the hospital so soon after your accident.” His voice was husky. “Jesus, Dianna. How the hell did you manage to walk away from the crash?”
His question echoed the same one swimming around in her head since waking up in the hospital with only a smattering of cuts and scrapes: Why had she been saved?
And now, after being spared for the second time in a matter of days, instead of dying when anyone else would have, she couldn’t hide from the fact that she’d been given a second, and now a third, chance to get things right.
But what was she supposed to change this time around?
The big change couldn’t have something to do with Sam, could it? Especially now that they’d cleared the air after their motel room blowout and could actually talk without biting each other’s heads off.
The dangerous bend of her thoughts sent her stumbling out of Sam’s arms to her feet.
She needed some space, some breathing room, needed to get away from his dangerous pull over her so that she could behave rationally, rather than reacting to a base physical urge.
Sam was at her side in a heartbeat, one hand on her elbow, the other on the small of her back. “Easy now.”
“I’m okay,” she told him.
It was a lie. She wasn’t okay, and not just because of her fall.
Being close to him like this, feeling his bare hands on her skin, made her burn up inside, with a fever that only he could quench.
She swayed into him and his words were barely louder than a whisper. “God help me, Dianna, I still want you. More than ever. More than I should.”
Her tongue came out to uncertainly lick her lower lip, and then, suddenly, his hands were in her hair and his mouth was on hers, almost hard enough to hurt.
And yet his rough kiss was exactly what she needed.
Exactly what she craved.
He slid his hands over the wet fabric covering her collarbone, then over her shoulders and down the length of her spine to the small of her back. Grabbing her hips, he pulled her in tight against him.
She was standing on just enough of a rise that the hollow between her thighs fit perfectly around his erection.
“I want you, too,” she whispered against his lips when they pulled apart an inch. “So much I can’t stand it.”
He backed her up against a smooth rock face, and as he ran kisses down her neck, from her earlobe to the hollow of her shoulder, she shuddered in his arms. His hands found the gap between her shirt and pants, and as he brushed his fingers over her belly, she moaned softly.
And then he kissed her mouth again and she slid her tongue against his. His fingers went higher and higher, and when he finally found the edge of her bra, she heard herself begging, “Please touch me.”
Slipping his fingers under the thin fabric, he curved his palm over her breast, her nipple hard against his hand.
She cried out and he covered her sound of pleasure with his mouth as he gently squeezed her tingling flesh. With painstaking slowness, he slid her shirt up over her skin, his lips nipping at hers, drawing out a low moan from her throat. And then he was pulling his mouth away and going to his knees and she could feel his warm breath on the exposed skin of her stomach. He pressed his lips to her belly once, twice, and then he was moving up the center of her rib cage, finally sucking one hard nipple into his mouth, then the other, cupping both breasts with his hands, rubbing his lightly stubbled chin against her skin.
Another moan escaped her, this time around his name, and then he was undoing the button at the top of her pants and sliding down the zipper, pulling the fabric down her hips to pool at her ankles.
He stopped laving her breasts with his tongue and lifted his head to watch her face as he slipped a finger into her panties. She pushed her pelvis into his hand, more aroused than she could ever remember being.
Knowing he wanted her as badly as she wanted him made her even wetter, even more aroused.
Circling the spot she so desperately wanted him to touch, he finally made contact—oh yes, right there!—and she gasped as exquisite sensations moved through her, from her core outward. Again and again his fingers slid between her slick folds. Up, then down, they moved between her labia, bumping over the hard nub of her arousal. His mouth found her next, his warm breath and soft lips covering her mound, his tongue probing, tasting as she cried out with pleasure.
She’d never felt so ripe, so ready to explode. She’d waited ten long years to feel this good again, and now that she was here with Sam, and his hands and mouth were on her, she wanted to make the incredible sensations last forever.
But she was so ready, too ready, and she couldn’t stop herself from grasping the back of his head and pushing her pelvis into his tongue and teeth. And then his fingers joined his mouth, stretching her open.
Even this wet, it had been so long since she’d been with a man that his touch felt brand-new and she panted, “Oh God, Sam,” against his shoulder as he kept the rhythm of his fingers and tongue steady.
“You feel so good,” she groaned as she closed her eyes and tilted her head back, sucking in a hard breath in the same moment that her inner muscles clamped down hard on his fingers.
Her entire body shuddered into a powerful orgasm and Dianna felt like she had bypassed death and gone straight to heaven.
In the past decade, she hadn’t forgotten how potent Sam’s touch was. Forgetting something so wonderful would have been impossible.
But this all-encompassing pleasure was a shock to her system, nonetheless.
If she could, she’d stay like this forever, but they were far from done, and she wanted to tear his pants off and take him deep inside.
She sank to her knees in front of him and cupped his face in her hands as she leaned in to kiss him. Their tongues mated, a salty-sweet dance that was unbearably exciting. Dying to relearn his beautiful body, the hard planes of muscle and the deep indentations in between, she ran her hands over his damp shirt, awed by his broad shoulders, his hard chest, his impressive abdominal muscles.
“Dianna,” he said, the low rumble of his voice making her want him more than ever. “I’ve never had a problem controlling myself. Only with you.”
It was the same for her and all she wanted was to give him the same pleasure he’d given her. But even as she ripped at the buttons on his shirt, she knew loving him was as much for herself as it was for him.
At last, the buttons came undone and she stilled as she took in his magnificent bare chest. Tanned, with only the lightest sprinkling of hair between his pectoral muscles.
“You’re so beautiful,” she murmured. “I’ve dreamed of this a hundred times. Tell me this isn’t a dream.”
“It couldn’t be more real,” he said before threading his fingers through her hair and kissing her.
She was blown away by the passion and desire that radiated from his mouth and hands and body. Second by second he was sweeping her farther and farther downriver, heading straight for a waterfall, and even though she knew there was no way to be prepared for the drop, she didn’t care.
All that mattered was the way she felt right here, right now, in Sam’s arms.
When the kiss finally ended, she lay her cheek on his chest and closed her eyes to listen to the rapid drumbeat of his heart. His arms were wonderfully strong around her as he held her close and it was only the insistent throbbing between her thighs that made her shift away from his heat so that she could kiss his chest.
He groaned with pleasure when she found his nipple with her tongue. It had always driven him crazy when she circled it, then flicked it lightly. His excitement fed hers and she fumbled for the waistband of his jeans. The edge of her palm brushed against his erection and even with two layers of fabric between his shaft and her hand, her need was so intense that she couldn’t stop herself from palming the long, thick length through his clothes.
He twitched once, then twice against her palm, and she was reaching for his zipper to set him loose, when his hand came over hers and squeezed.
Wait. Something was wrong. Something had changed.
It took longer than it should have for her brain to send out the alert that this wasn’t a warm, loving touch; it was a warning.
“We can’t do this, Dianna.”
Alarm shot through her, fast and furious, embarrassment close on its heels. With fumbling hands, she pushed away from him and fixed her pants, her bra, her shirt.
Despite his previous warnings about staying away from their past, despite her own strong misgivings, he’d seemed to want her as much as she wanted him. And on the heels of her thoughts about second chances, she’d jumped at the chance to be intimate with him.
Why hadn’t she stopped herself? Wasn’t she older? Wiser?
Shouldn’t she have known better than to dance this close to the scalding flames?
But just as she was trying to close the lid on her feelings for Sam, forever this time, she heard it again, a voice in her head saying, You fought for your sister. You fought for your career. Maybe this time you should fight for Sam.
A combination of feeling sorry for her and being scared shitless by almost losing her in the river had made him act stupidly. He’d been so glad she was alive, he’d given in to the urge to see if she tasted as good now as she always had.
Only to find out that she was so much sweeter than any of his memories.
Touching her, kissing her, hearing her cry out in ecstasy had taken Sam straight to the edge, even though his clothes were still on and he’d only gotten to third base. But then, when she turned the tables and started kissing him, it had been nearly impossible for him to stop, to take a frickin’ breath and remember why making love to Dianna was a terrible idea.
From deep in his subconscious, Connor’s voice rose up and nailed him. “She’s bad for you, man. And you were royally fucked-up after she left. I don’t want to see you like that again.”
Jesus, how could he have forgotten? At this rate, he’d end up with far more than he’d bargained for when he’d agreed to help find her sister. Much more than some incredibly hot sex against a rock.
He’d end up back in love with her.
And then when she left him to go back to her glossy, celebrity-soaked world, he’d be staring straight into a black hole again.
Getting kicked in the heart once in a lifetime was enough for him, thanks.
The sick feeling in the pit of his gut grew as she scrambled away from him. He forced himself to stand up and take a step away from her, even though he was desperate to make her come again.
“I screwed up, Dianna.” Each repentant word was harder to spit out than the last. “I lost control and acted stupid.”
A heavy silence hung between them as she stared at him with unblinking green eyes, not saying anything.
“Fortunately, we’re almost to the end of the river,” he said, hoping that getting back on task would permanently halt this twisted game they were playing. “If all goes well, we might be able to get to the commune by tonight.”
Hurt and confusion flashed across her face at his emotionless, businesslike words. He was back to playing asshole again. Making her come and then shutting down the second her orgasm was over.
Unfortunately, he couldn’t see any other way to proceed.
Needing to break out of her sexual force field, he turned around and strode into the water to retrieve the raft. Minutes later, he was disconcerted to note that her eyes remained glued to him as he dragged it through the cold water and up onto the shore.
“Maybe it wasn’t a mistake, Sam.”
She paused, licked her lips, giving him just enough time to run through everything that had happened against the rock, all the places he’d kissed and touched.
“Maybe what happened was inevitable. Maybe you and I are inevitable.”
Desire tightened around him with each word. He never should have kissed her. Never should have told her that he couldn’t stop himself from wanting her.
“No,” he said, acting instinctively to stop the pull. “You and I were over ten years ago. We’re here to find April. That’s it.”
He watched her flinch at his hard words, but instead of telling him he was a jerk like any other woman would have, she took a step closer.
“I wanted it just as much as you did,” she said, refusing to back down, to take no for an answer. “After everything we talked about last night and this morning, I think we agree that we’re different people now. We both lived through the miscarriage. We lived through the breakup. I know why you acted the way you did. And you know why I acted the way I did.”
Another step closer.
“I’ve never cared about another man, Sam. Only you.”
So close that he could reach out and pull her into a kiss.
“Tell me you love someone else—tell me you’ve loved anyone else like you loved me—and I’ll drop it.”
He knew the lie he needed to tell to shut her down forever, but standing on the banks of the Colorado River with her sweet scent lingering on his fingers, he just couldn’t do it.
“There isn’t anybody else,” he admitted. “There’s never been anyone else.”
Her eyes flashed hope, and he forced himself to say, “But whether we’ve loved other people doesn’t matter, Dianna. This is still a bad idea.”
He watched as she pulled back her shoulders, straightened her spine, and tilted her chin, gearing up for a battle.
“You say we were over ten years ago, but you touch me like we’re just getting started,” she chall
enged. “Give me one good reason we shouldn’t try again.”
Fuck. Thus far he’d been able to keep his period of self-destruction buried. But she’d never drop the notion of getting back together, of trying again, if he didn’t lay everything on the line.
“When you left—”
Shit, sacrificing his pride was harder than he’d thought it would be.
“I fought every goddamned fire this side of the Mississippi, but I just couldn’t get over you.”
She took another step closer, coming only inches away. “I couldn’t get over you either, Sam.”
He held up a hand to halt her forward momentum. “You asked for a reason and I’m giving you one. You went to San Francisco and grabbed a better life with both hands. I almost threw mine away.”
Confusion furrowed her brows. “What are you talking about? You’re still a hotshot. Still living in Tahoe surrounded by your friends, your crew, and your brother.”
“I almost lost it all, Dianna. I jumped straight into a black hole, wanted it to swallow me up.”
Shaking her head as if nothing he was saying made sense, she said, “I don’t get it. What do you mean, black hole?”
He ran his hands through his hair, hating every second of soul baring. He would have happily given up a limb instead.
“After you left, I reverted to the same place I was in during high school. But worse. More drinking. More all-nighters. Waking up and not knowing where I was. Skipping out on the rest of the crew. Not showing up for fires and working half-assed and hungover when I managed to get up the mountain.”
Understanding suddenly flooded her eyes. “I’m so sorry,” she said, “sorry about everything.” Her eyes clouded with regret. “When I look back now, I can see what a scared, confused eighteen-year-old kid I was,” she admitted softly. “If I’d known what was going to happen, what leaving would do to both of us, I never would have …” She let the rest of her sentence fall away, saying instead, “You can’t beat yourself up for one bad choice, Sam.”
“It wasn’t one bad choice, it was a hundred bad choices. If it weren’t for Connor …”