“Cheap and easy,” he said as he threw himself onto the divan, and the delicate, antique furniture creaked with the weight of his big body. He shifted to one side of the divan and patted the space beside him. “Come on, Mags. The least you can do is listen to me after I risked life and limb to come see you.”
He faked a pout, and she imagined him as a little boy, using that pout to wheedle something from his mom and, later, the assortment of caretakers who had watched the boys over the years. “That,” she said as she sat beside him and circled her finger around his mouth, “won’t work with me. But if you want to have an adult conversation about our situation, I’m game.”
Her words seemed to have the effect of a cold bucket of water being tossed on him, since he sobered up for an instant. “Seriously? You’re willing to discuss it?”
She had to laugh at his surprise. “Seriously? Yes, I am. We’ve been avoiding each other for too long—”
“Since that night when we were eighteen?” he jumped in, focusing his charcoal-gray gaze on her attentively.
Heat surged across her cheeks as the memories swamped her. She covered them with her hands to avoid his scrutiny. “That was a mistake. We were both young and inexperienced. A little drunk as well, if I recall correctly.”
* * *
Owen loved the blossom of pink across her cheeks and her obvious discomfiture. While they may have both been young and maybe a little tipsy, he recollected her response, and it had not been lacking in any way.
“Funny, but I remember it was kinda nice,” he said, closing his eyes for a moment to drag up that memory. Maggie in her bikini, her body lean but with all those curves he itched to touch. Her blue eyes, bright like a summer sky, darkening with pleasure as he’d caressed her cheek and urged her closer for a kiss.
“Owen, wake up,” she urged, and he slowly opened his eyes to meet her questioning gaze. Then he dipped his gaze down and hers followed. Another layer of color painted her cheeks as she noticed what was happening in his jeans.
“I’m more than awake, as you can see,” he teased and cradled her face. Urging her gaze back up, he said, “You were beautiful then, and you’re even more beautiful now.”
“Is that all this is? Physical attraction?” she said and gestured to the very obvious bulge visible beneath the denim.
He stroked a thumb across the stain of pink on her cheek before dipping his thumb down to trace the edges of her lips. “It’s a good start,” he said, because as much as he wanted to tell her how much he liked her intelligence and poise, his brain couldn’t find a way to say it just right. He wanted it to be just right with her in every way that it could be.
“Kiss me, Maggie. Please,” he said and eased his hand behind her neck to apply gentle pressure and draw her closer.
Her soft sigh of resignation spilled across his lips a second before the moist warmth of her mouth covered them.
Sweet lord but he loved the feel of her. The taste of her, he thought as he met her kiss. He accepted the mingling of her breath with his and the fluid brush of her lips across his. As the kiss deepened, he opened his mouth and licked her lips, silently pleaded for her to open to him, and she did, accepting the slide of his tongue. Meeting it with her own.
He groaned, his head whirling with everything that was Maggie and that he’d wanted for so long.
* * *
Maggie drew away slightly at his ragged sound and explored his face, slightly flushed now from their kisses. His eyes, those startling, dark eyes shot through with threads of silver, had darkened to nearly black, but they were a little sleepy, making her reconsider what was happening at that moment.
“You’re more than a little wasted, you know.”
He grinned, and two deep dimples erupted at the sides of his mouth. With a shaky nod, he said, “Just a bit.”
More than a bit, and surely enough to cloud his judgment. As for her, that one steamy kiss they’d just shared had her picturing where this could lead, but not when she felt like she might be taking advantage of him.
“Just enough,” she said and sat up.
“Are you seriously not going to…you know,” he said and levered himself up on one elbow so they were eye to slightly unfocused eye.
“And the fact that you can’t even call it what it is at this moment is reason enough for us to wait until you’re back to normal,” she said.
He did that little-boy pout again, only it wasn’t an act this time. “Normal Owen is boring and responsible.”
She so knew where that was coming from and cupped his jaw. “Normal Owen is just my cup of tea. I don’t need a shark like your dad or an all-action guy like Jonathan.”
He chuckled and said, “Jon was the one who dared me to climb up here like he used to for Connie.”
Now it was her turn to be surprised. “What? Connie? When?”
Owen cursed and shook his head. “Shit, it was supposed to be a secret.”
Maggie had thought she and her friends never kept any secrets from one another.
Sensing her upset, Owen laid a hand on her thigh and stroked it reassuringly. “It was a long time ago. When we were kids. Whatever they had flamed out ages ago. It’s probably why she never mentioned it.”
“Yeah, probably,” she said but rather unconvincingly.
Trying to ease her past her distress, he lightheartedly said, “Please don’t make me climb back down that vine.”
A small laugh escaped her, and she shook her head. “I won’t.” She paused for a second and heard the sounds of Connie and Emma out in the hall.
Owen must have heard them as well. “Your friends are still awake.”
Biting her lip, she said, “You may have to wait to leave.”
He arched a raven-dark brow. “Keeping secrets?”
“I don’t keep secrets from my friends,” she said, more sharply than she wanted, but she was still stinging a little from what he’d unintentionally revealed about Connie and Jonathan.
He lifted his brow another condemning inch. “But you want me to wait here so they don’t see me, and that’s not a secret?”
She hated that despite the influence of both beer and bourbon and Jonathan’s challenge, he could still be relatively logical. “I will tell them when the time is right, which is not now. I’ll be right back.”
She dashed from her room, leaving him lying on the divan, and raced down to the current source of the noise—the kitchen.
Connie sat at the breakfast bar while Emma placed perfect little scoops of cookie dough on a baking sheet. Both her friends looked up at her arrival.
“Damn, now you ruined our surprise. We were going to bring you up some of Emma’s famous chocolate chip pistachio cookies,” Connie said and drew out the stool beside her, obviously intending for her to join them.
Maggie bit back that if anyone was going to be surprised, it was her friends. But as much as she wanted to get back to Owen and their discussion and what might follow, there was no way she could refuse an offering of Emma’s cookies. If she did, her friends would definitely know something was up, because she had never, in all the years that they’d been friends, refused any of Emma’s delicious cookie creations.
“I’ll get the milk,” she said and busied herself with that and setting out plates and glasses for when the cookies were ready. She hoped that by doing so, she could avoid anyone noticing that something out of the ordinary was up.
Her hopes were dashed when eagle-eyed Connie asked, “You feeling okay? You look a little flushed.”
“My room’s too warm. I had to open the french doors to catch a breeze,” she said and hated lying to her friend, but it might explain if they’d noticed anything earlier. She averted her gaze, poured the milk, sat on the stool beside Connie, and waited for Emma, who joined them after popping the baking sheet into the oven.
“It won’t take long,�
� Emma said and likewise scrutinized her. “You are red, Mags. Are you sure you’re not coming down with something?”
“I’m fine,” she said. To take the heat off herself and see what if anything remained of the attraction between Connie and Jonathan, she said, “Did you get a load of Jon out on the waves today? He still looks great out there.”
“He’s a show-off,” Connie complained, grabbed hold of her glass, and slid it back and forth on the counter in a nervous gesture.
“Say what you will, he’s way hot,” Emma said.
Connie’s head jerked up in shock. “You think he’s hot? Really?”
Emma shrugged in a nonchalant way. “He’s definitely got that bad boy, surfer dude thing going on in a major way. Have you ever watched him when he peels off his wet suit?” Emma fanned her face and grinned. “A Chippendale dancer couldn’t do a better striptease.”
“I never noticed,” Connie said and continued with the uneasy juggling of her glass.
“Wow, Con, that’s hard to believe,” Emma said and glanced toward Maggie. “You’ve seen him, right?”
In truth, Maggie had been busy thinking about Owen and how he used to surf. He didn’t get out on the water as often as Jonathan did, but he hadn’t been a slouch when they were teens. Earlier that night, just before dusk fell, Owen had managed to catch a few nice waves beside his brother, and if Jonathan had done a stripping act, she hadn’t noticed because she’d been too busy watching Owen peel off his wet suit.
“She’s all googly eyed, so she’s probably dreaming about Owen,” Connie said, very effectively turning the tables and attention back to Maggie.
Emma peered at her, narrowing her green-eyed gaze to assess the impact of Connie’s statement. With a shake of her head and an explosive laugh, she said, “No way. Maggie is just not the googly-eyed type, but…any change from our last chat?”
Because the new round of smoochies had not changed anything yet, she could honestly say, “If there was any change, you two would be the first to know.”
When she was done, she pointedly looked at Connie, who clearly took the hint that Maggie knew more than she was saying.
The ding of the kitchen timer dragged their attention to the oven, and she finally noticed the enticing aroma of the buttery, nutty cookies and chocolate.
“Smells delicious,” she said.
Emma brought over the baking sheet and a cooling rack. She placed the hot sheet on a trivet she had laid out earlier. When Maggie reached for a cookie, wanting to move the night along and get back to Owen, Emma smacked her hand playfully.
“Don’t be a pig. You know they have to cool a little.”
“In a rush? Got a hot date?” Connie asked, her perfectly manicured eyebrows raised in challenge.
“I’ve got a case of midnight munchies,” she said, and it wasn’t far from the truth. The tempting smell of the cookies had awakened her hunger. She didn’t have long to wait as, within a few minutes, Emma moved the cookies to the cooling rack and, after another few minutes, announced that they were free to indulge. The warm cookies were, as always, delicious, especially when paired with the ice-cold milk.
“You really should think about selling these,” she said and grabbed a second cookie that she immediately devoured.
“I just like to play around with them. Besides, I’m too busy with the wedding planning.”
“And Carlo,” Connie interjected and reached for another cookie.
Emma rapped her hand and said, “You can’t tease me and expect to have another treat.”
Connie brought her hands together in a pleading gesture. “Pretty please. No more mention of your Carlo.”
With a playful pout, Emma said, “You’re excused.”
Which gave Maggie the perfect opening she was looking for. “Speaking of excused. I’m kind of tired. I’ve been up since five, and that ride down did me in. I’m going to head up to bed.”
Although both of her friends seemed a little taken aback by her comment, they recovered quickly.
“Sure, it was a long day with the traffic and all,” Connie said.
“I’m a little beat from the event today too. I’m looking forward to sleeping in tomorrow,” Emma added.
“Sounds great. Good night, you two,” she said and hugged both of them before hurrying back to her bedroom. And Owen.
He was right where she left him. Only he was fast asleep on the divan, snoring softly.
She walked over and considered waking him up, but she could still hear Connie and Emma downstairs. It would be just as easy for him to sneak out in the morning, and she was tired. She hadn’t lied about that.
Grabbing the crocheted throw that she kept on the bench at the end of her bed, she covered him, walked to her bed, climbed in, and shut off the lights. But as tired as she was, it was a long time before she could drive away the memory of that night’s kiss and the realization that if she wanted more, Owen was just feet away.
Those thoughts chased her into sleep and a long night filled with sexy dreams of being with Owen. Of kissing him and having him touch her. Feeling the weight of him pressing her down into the mattress. But as she gradually woke to the very pleasant sensation of his lips on hers and his warmth tucked along the length of her body, she realized it was no fantasy.
She broke away from the dreamy kiss and dragged a hand through her sleep-tousled hair.
“What are you doing here, Owen?”
A sexy smile stole slowly across his lips. “I must not be doing it right if you can’t tell.”
She chuckled despite herself and wagged her head. “I mean here, in my bed.”
He bopped his head in the direction of the divan. “That thing is frickin’ uncomfortable.”
“So you just decided to hop into bed with me?” she asked with an imperial lift of her brow that usually worked to dissuade a response from others. But not from Owen.
“You looked too good to resist,” he said, bent, and kissed her again, a leisurely exploration of her mouth that yanked a murmur of pleasure from her and a groan from Owen.
“I love that sound, Mags. I love the way you feel,” he said, and reaching up, he cradled her breast in his hand.
She wanted to protest, but the press of his hand on her felt way too good, and when he dragged his thumb across the tip, her nipple beaded into a hard point for him.
“Owen,” she said breathlessly and laid her hands on his shoulders, her gaze locked with his as he played with the sensitive tip, circling it with his fingers and making it even harder. Tweaking it gently and drawing another gasp of pleasure from her.
“I want to see, Mags. Taste. Feel you against me,” he said.
“So do I, Owen,” she whispered.
In a flurry of action, he ripped off his polo shirt, exposing the broad expanse of his chest and lean six-pack abs. But he took his time with her, nudging down the shoulder of her loose nightshirt to expose her breast and touch her again before bending to take her into his mouth.
She closed her eyes against the sensations he created with the lick of his tongue and the tender pull of his mouth. With the heat of his skin beneath her hands and all his hard muscle along the length of her body. Damp heat exploded between her legs, and she wrapped her arm around his shoulders, dug her fingers into the smooth muscles of his back as he gently teethed the tight nipple before soothing that love bite with a kiss.
Urging him on with soft cries of pleasure, she cradled the back of his head and held him close while he shifted his hand down her body and beneath the hem of her nightshirt.
* * *
Owen groaned as he found the soft curls at her center and realized she had nothing on under the nightshirt.
As she pressed her hips against his hand, his dick jumped in anticipation, but his über-responsible side reminded him that he had forgotten protection. But that didn’t mean he cou
ldn’t bring her pleasure. He parted her and swept his thumb across the sensitive nub at her center.
She jumped beneath him and held on to him tighter.
“I want to make you come, Mags. I want to hear you scream my name.”
“Owen,” she said, her tones urgent, almost demanding, and he nearly came himself at the thought of hearing her say his name as he entered her.
“Just like that, Mags,” he said and stroked her clit. He eased a finger inside her and stroked gently at first, building her passion. Increasing the pressure of his caresses against the sensitive nub and inside her. Bending to take her breast in his mouth again, he licked and sucked the tender flesh until, with another powerful thrust of his fingers, she bucked up off the bed, climaxing beneath his hands, and called out his name.
A harsh breath escaped him as he fought not to embarrass himself by coming in his pants. Especially when she urged him over her body and spread her legs to straddle his thighs.
“Maggie, I can’t. I didn’t bring protection,” he said, apologetic. Frustrated that in his very buzzed state of excitement the night before, he hadn’t planned ahead.
The knowing smile she cast his way nearly undid him. “I’m sure you’re aware that there are other ways—”
“I know, but it doesn’t have to be tit for tat,” he said, hoping he wouldn’t rue his patience.
She smirked and glanced down at her exposed breast, still hard from his caresses. “I think you already got the tit part,” she teased.
He thought he detected a very feline purr of satisfaction in her words. Heat poured through him, and he just couldn’t resist. Bending, he took her breast into his mouth again, sucking the tight tip deep before reluctantly releasing it with a tender kiss.
“I need to go before I lose the last of my common sense,” he said and pushed off the bed. He grabbed his shirt from the floor where he had tossed it and jerked it back on.
* * *
Maggie watched him dress but didn’t hurry to put her nightshirt back to rights.
Let him look, she thought, eager to explore the power of their mutual attraction. Hoping he wouldn’t take too long to come back for another round. When she finally left the bed and slipped on a robe, he walked to where she stood and placed his hands on the slope of her hips, the gesture possessive and erotic. It was too easy to imagine his hands there, guiding her as she rode him.
One Summer Night Page 9