by Trish Morey
She turned in his arms, slid hers around his neck and pressed her lips to the vee of his open shirt, squirming her hips closer against his growing hardness. “I like your family. They’re very...” She kissed his chest again and then pulled his head down and kissed him hard, sucking him into her hot mouth.
He growled his approval. “Very what?”
“Hot. Like you.”
He was getting there, his temperature rising along with an erection that was growing harder with every beating pulse of his blood and a need to be inside this woman that was damned near combustible. “I’m seriously thinking it’s time we took this inside.”
“How’s the spa going?”
“It’ll do.”
“Is it bad luck to make love the night before your wedding?”
“I’d say it would be bad luck for the both of us if we didn’t.”
She smiled up at him, the moonlight lighting up the highlights in her hair, matching the golden flecks in her cognac eyes, not waiting to move inside as she got to work unbuttoning his shirt. “That’s the right answer.”
They peeled their clothes off each other as they went, and made it to the bath almost naked, desperate for the touch of skin against skin and the slide of flesh against flesh.
“Perfect,” he said, testing the water.
“Almost,” she said, scooping rose petals from a bowl and scattering them on the surface, the rose perfume released and rising in the heated water.
“I’m going to come out smelling like a flower,” he protested.
“No,” she said, “you’re going to come out smelling like me. If you play your cards right, that is.”
He growled and dragged off what was left of her underwear, testing her slick folds, finding them incendiary as he discarded his own in the rush to get her into the spa after him. He pulled her astride him. Her breasts bobbed on the water, her dark nipples an invitation to his mouth and his swirling tongue, while her core teased his tip, rocking him against her swollen clit.
Until he pulled her down hard as he drove into her and she gasped and cried out and it was like their first, frenetic time together again, except this time it was better, because this time it wasn’t just a moment, this time was a taste of forever.
Afterwards, on the bed where he’d finally bundled her, he pressed his lips to the tattoo on her back. “This is you,” he said, “my phoenix, reborn and strong.”
“You have a lot to do with that.”
“No, you did it, Ava. You had it in you all the time. You pulled yourself from hell and made yourself new again. I’m so proud of you.” He traced the lines of the stylised phoenix on her shoulder and saw her eyelids flutter closed.
And then she spoke. “I can’t forgive her, you know. I don’t think I ever will. But I feel like I understand her more now. She was a prisoner too.” Then she gave a long sigh and opened her eyes. “I was speaking to Dare about the babies.”
His fingers stopped where they were on her skin. “Oh?”
“She let me feel them move. It was incredible. I felt them tumble under my hand. So tiny, but already so strong, and I didn’t want to say anything then, but I’ve been thinking ever since...” She pressed herself up on her elbow and looked evenly at him. “I wondered if I could do that? After all that’s happened, could I be a mother? I mean, a good one?”
“Oh, Ava,” he said, reaching for her hand, pressing his mouth to the back of it, “I’ve seen you with children. You love kids and they love you. You’d be the best kind of mother.”
“Do you really think so?”
“I know so.”
There was moisture in her eyes and he reached up with the pad of one thumb and gently wiped it away.
“I think I’d like to try, that is, if you wanted to. I think I would like to have your babies.”
He felt moisture dampen the corners of his own eyes then, and it was no wonder, as his heart swelled so big for this woman, there was no room for anything else inside his chest. He slid his hand behind her head, lacing his fingers through her hair. He’d never thought himself a poet, but he felt himself coming over all William Shakespeare right about now.
“You know how much I love you, Ava? Do you know how long I will love you? I will love you to the ends of time and I will still be there for you, wherever we are, whatever we are. We’ll be together forever. I promise you.”
Ava smiled, her eyes bright. “I love you, Caleb. Thank you for teaching me how to trust again. Thank you for teaching me not to be afraid of love. Thank you for not giving up on me, when, by rights, you could have walked away.”
He wrapped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her towards his mouth. “I’m never walking away from you, Ava. Never. Trust me on that.”
“I do,” she said, testing out the words she’d need tomorrow, before his lips met hers and his kiss told her it was true.
The End
The Hot Aussie Knights
Headed by grandfather Leonard (The Legend) Knight, the Knight family is fire-fighting royalty in Australia. Two generations have followed in Leonard’s highly distinguished footsteps and nowadays, despite being scattered across the length and breadth of Australia, it’s the five Knight cousins who keep the Hot Aussie Knight legacy alive, working hard and playing hard, day and night.
Book 1: Hot Mess by Amy Andrews
Book 2: Burning Both Ends by Sinclair Jayne
Book 3: Long Hot Summer by Victoria Purman
Book 4: Burning Love by Trish Morey
Enjoy an exclusive excerpt from...
Hot Mess
Book 1 in the Hot Aussie Knight series
Copyright © 2017 Amy Andrews
Logan Knight stood at the upstairs windows of the firehouse with his brother Duncan indulging in one of their favourite pastimes – guess the panties. So far they’d spotted several thongs, a lot of bikini briefs and the odd pair of grundies—granny undies.
One of the advantages of the house being in the centre of Brisbane was its proximity to the large population of female workers. It didn’t hurt that it was smack bang in the middle of a street strewn with cafes and bars ensuring that a good proportion of these women walked past the house during their lunch breaks.
“I reckon that one’s going completely commando,” Duncan said, pointing to a redhead with no discernible panty line. Or DPL as they liked to call it.
“Hard to tell in jeans,” Logan mused. “Could be a thong. She’d have to bend over to be sure. I need to see lack of butt floss.”
And then, as if by magic, the woman dropped something and folded over from the waist as she snatched it off the ground.
“Well, whaddya know?” Duncan grinned. “There is a god.”
“Awesome mind control, Bro.” Logan high-fived his brother as they watched the low-riding jeans do their thing, sliding perilously lower. No peek of the thin elastic straps of a thong which would definitely be on display by now had she been wearing one.
“Damn, man, I think you’re right. She’s not wearing any panties.”
“You two are deviants.”
Logan grinned at Duncan as they turned to face their colleague.
“Sure,” Duncan agreed, unperturbed by the characterisation. “But we’re loveable deviants, right?”
Ruth Gilligan stood, arms crossed, shaking her head at them. At twenty-nine, the same age as Logan, she was one of only two women that made up the thirty-strong squad. And the only black female firefighter in the state.
Originally from one of the smaller islands in the Torres Strait, she was fit and strong and excellent at her job. She wasn’t afraid of hard work, pulled her weight, and didn’t take any of their shit. She could shoulder lift a hundred and fifty kilo man as easily as she could put him on his ass if he gave her any lip.
“I think that’s an oxymoron,” she said.
“Aww, come on now, Gilligan, that’s no way to talk about my baby brother.” Duncan jabbed his fist at Logan’s gut but he was way too fast for his older brot
her, laughing easily as he dodged the hit.
Ruth rolled her eyes. “I rest my case.” She joined them at the window, perusing the parade of people out front. “Any decent guys out there? Someone who doesn’t mind a strong, black woman with, according to my last boyfriend, a reckless death wish?”
“I hate to break this to you, Gilligan, but we haven’t exactly been checking the dudes out. Besides...” Duncan thumped his chest. “Why look any further when you have such awesome specimens at your fingertips?”
“No thanks, I know where you dirty bastards have been.” She pointed to a woman in a clingy T-shirt. “That chick’s not wearing a bra.”
Logan and Duncan’s heads quickly snapped to the direction of Ruth’s point. As a breast man, Logan enjoyed the bouncy view. It wasn’t very PC but hell if he cared right at this moment.
“Looks like it’s cold out as well,” Duncan mused, a laugh in his voice.
It was hot enough to melt bitumen.
The woman turned into a building and disappeared and Logan glanced at Ruth. “I thought you were sworn off men. Or were waiting for Chris Hemsworth or something like –”
“Hey, dude,” Duncan interrupted, “there’s a woman looking up at the house who’s the spitting image of Bella.”
Bella? Logan’s pulse spiked.
“What?” He whipped his head back to the street view, his gaze hunting up and down, searching for long blonde hair. “Where?” He growled, not seeing anyone who remotely matched her description.
Duncan pointed. “Sitting on that low wall over there under the tree. She’s eating a sandwich or something.”
Heartbeat stampeding like a herd of rhino through all his pulse points, Logan’s gaze settled on the woman in question. His first thought was to reject his brother’s assertion out of hand. Everything about her was just... different.
She was too far away to assess the colour of her eyes but this woman had short, choppy hair, more honey than blonde. There was more padding on her bones although, God knew, Bella had been too skinny. But more than that, it was the way she sat, the way she held herself.
She was too... tranquil. Relaxed. Serene. Or something...
Arabella Tucker had been a ball of energy. Sitting under a tree, unhurriedly eating as if she had all the time in the world had not been part of her repertoire. Released from the strictures of her good-girl upbringing when she’d been nineteen, she’d launched herself into life full steam ahead and he’d been hard put keeping up with her.
Sky diving. Bungee jumping. Rock climbing. White river rafting. Clubbing all night. Early morning jogging along the river banks or heading to the coast at dawn for a surf, the sun rising behind them as they rode their boards into the shore.
Being with her had been the most exhilarating – and gut-wrenching – year of his life.
Suddenly, the woman opposite tilted her head. That was all – just a slight movement really. But she might as well have stood up and slugged him with a blast from a fire hose for the impact the mannerism had on him. He sucked in a breath.
It was her. He’d know that head tilt anywhere. Arabella Tucker.
Bella.
His brother frowned. “Logan?”
“Christ,” he said, pushing a hand through his short brown hair. “I think you’re right.”
Logan blinked. And blinked again. Why the hell was she just sitting there outside, studying the firehouse like a... architectural student – like a stranger – instead of a woman who knew it inside out?
Why hadn’t she come in and asked for him? Sure, they hadn’t parted ways on the best of terms but that was eight years ago for fuck’s sake. Wasn’t she at least curious about him? Didn’t she want to at least say hi for old time’s sake?
“What are you going to –”
Logan didn’t give his brother a chance to finish. He didn’t stop to consult or converse with either him or Ruth. He just ran. Ran like the city was burning down and only he could put it out.
She might not want to renew acquaintance but he sure as hell did. There was a part of him that always wondered about her. How she was doing? Where life had taken her? Was she a lawyer now? Had she married? Did she have children?
His lungs felt too big for his chest at the thought. Was she happy?
Now he had the chance to find out.
All three of the large, red station doors that had formed part of the iconic façade of the station since it had been built over a hundred years ago were open as his foot hit the cement of the engine bay. He scissor-jumped over a pile of equipment in his way. It was being sorted by one of the squad and Logan’s jump almost put the guy on his ass.
“Fuck, man, where’s the fire?”
Logan ignored him. He just kept going, his gaze eagerly searching for the woman as he burst onto the busy street. She had sunglasses on now and she was standing, crumpling up the sandwich wrapper in her hand and walking towards a nearby bin, still looking in his direction.
A steady stream of cars separated them and he waved at her as he waited impatiently for a break in the traffic. She didn’t acknowledge him but who could tell where she was actually looking behind those dark lenses?
The lights at the intersection changed and Logan took advantage of the slowing traffic as she turned away. He weaved in between the cars, hitting the pavement at a half jog.
“Bella,” he called to her back as she walked in the opposite direction.
She didn’t stop. Or turn around. Maybe she hadn’t heard him? He lengthened his stride, quickly closing the distance between them.
“Bella,” he said again, reaching for her arm, sliding his hand onto it, pulling on it to slow her down.
She slowed, stopped, turned and glanced down at his hand before raising her face. The tint of her glasses made it impossible to see her eyes properly but she was definitely looking at him now.
“Bella.” He smiled, the familiar feeling of her seeping through his gut.
She frowned at him and pulled her arm away.
“It’s me,” he said, his hand falling away. “Logan.”
She stared at him for long moments, her head tilted just so again, her teeth sinking into her bottom lip the way they’d always done when she was contemplating something. “I see.”
Logan blinked. I see? What the fuck did that mean? She was looking at him like she wasn’t sure of him, like she didn’t even know him. She might have wiped him all those years ago and she might not still feel the familiar flare sparking to life inside him all over again but she had felt it once upon a time.
As keenly, as desperately as him. Of that he was sure.
No way could eight years erase the memory of that. Hell, he doubted eighty years was enough.
She pulled off her sunglasses, the blue-green of her eyes as familiar to him as his own flinty grey. Her gaze roamed over his face, inspecting it, a slight frown drawing together honey-blonde eyebrows. “We... know each other, don’t we?”
“Ha!” Logan laughed. “Very funny, Bella.”
“Bella...”
She said it quietly, drawing the word out, as if she was weighing it up, testing it to see how it sounded on her tongue. Logan supposed back in snooty Melbourne with her snooty family in their snooty legal world she’d reverted to Arabella.
Christ, she looked good. Sure, she was looking wary and slightly puzzled but it was a vast improvement on the last time he’d seen her. Her face puffy and tear-stained, a blank, tired look staring back at him.
She looked healthy. Well.
The questions crowded his brain thick and fast until the pressure of them became too much and they were spilling out his mouth. “How... have you been? What are you doing in Brisbane? How long have you been here for? You cut your hair.”
He brought his hand up to touch it but she tensed and he dropped it, his stomach dropping as well. He ploughed on trying to ignore the sick feeling in his gut. “Are you a lawyer now? Are you... here with anyone? Are you... married?”
A husband. God,
even the thought of it burned like the twist of a hot poker into his flesh. She wasn’t wearing a ring. But that didn’t necessarily mean anything. Because why wouldn’t she be married? Why wouldn’t some guy have snapped her up by now?
“No.” She shook her head. “No husband.”
Logan’s breath rushed out on a relieved sigh. No husband. But there could still be a partner. There could be... kids.
“Look, I’m sorry.” She reached for his hand and held it loosely. He battled the urge to hold tighter not wanting to freak her out. “I really have to get back to court but... there was an accident. A few years ago, I was hurt. I... lost my memory. I have amnesia.”
Amnesia.
After, when Logan tried to recall this conversation, all he’d remember was the relentless beat of the sun on his shoulders and that word.
“Amnesia?”
She nodded quickly already shifting away from him. “Yes. I lost nine years. Everything from fifteen to twenty-four”—she used her hand to mimic an explosion coming from her head—“all gone. But I’m sorry...” She checked her watch and took a step back. “I really have to go. Maybe we could... meet for a coffee or a drink or something and I can explain more?”
Logan’s brain was not functioning properly at all. Bella had amnesia. He’d met her when she’d been nineteen so that meant...
She didn’t remember him.
Didn’t remember kissing under the stars on a Croatian beach, didn’t remember skinny-dipping with him at a secluded cove in the Whitsundays, didn’t remember him proposing to her on top of the Story Bridge.
Didn’t remember the baby.
“We don’t have to,” she said, her voice quiet, a frown knotting her brows as she took another step away from him.
Logan shook his head, dragging himself away from their memories and the devastating realisation that only he remembered them. “No... Yes...” He took a step towards her. “I’d like that.” He had to know more. “What about after work this afternoon? I knock off at five?”
She nodded and relief flowed cool and swift through his veins. “I do too. Officially. But things often run later. Is six too late?”