When she was certain he was either going to drop her or slide to the floor, he pushed away from the wall. Still holding her securely against his chest, Caleb staggered to the long couch across the room. He collapsed with a growly sigh then began to brush kisses on her hair while his hands stroked up and down her back in soothing, calming strokes.
She snuggled her cheek against his T-shirt and listened as his body returned to normal. She was not surprised that her heartbeat and breathing slowed along with his as they recovered. They were, after all, now fully bonded mates.
“What the fuck was that?” he asked after several long minutes as they sat and petted one another.
Goldie smiled against his chest. Taking a deep breath, she said softly, “The best sex ever.”
She tensed when his hands stopped moving on her back. She did not take another breath again until he began stroking a hand up and down her spine again. “That’s not exactly what I meant.”
Before he could continue, her stomach grumbled, a loud sound that his immediately echoed.
Lifting her head from his chest, she looked at him. “Are you hungry? I’m hungry. Shall we see what the committee left in the frig?”
“Can we talk while we eat?” he asked, holding her hips steady when she would have jumped from his lap.
“If we must,” she said, leaning up and kissing his cheek.
“We must. But first I think we should clean up and…oh shit, my bags.”
Goldie smiled as she watched him try to shut down the still-horny male side of him and become the emotionally disconnected deputy. She knew how he felt. If her stomach had not interrupted, she would have been willing to test the best-sex theory again and again and again.
“Knowing Teach, they’re sitting on the porch already. Relax, Deputy, it’s all good.”
* * * *
Twenty minutes later, Caleb sat down at the small table in the center of the kitchen as Goldie bustled around the room putting the finish touches on dinner. While he had pulled his pants back on and brought in his suitcases and duffel bag that were indeed sitting on the front porch, she had jumped in the shower.
By the time he stepped into the bathroom intending to join her in the shower, she had already turned off the water and was drying off. When she grabbed her clothes and ducked out of the bathroom, before he could stop her, disappointment filled him. Though he was starving, he would never have turned down a hot shower with a sexy woman.
Goldie looked nervous as she set a casserole dish on the table. While he had taken a quick shower, she set the table and put together a tossed salad. A loaf of homemade bread sat on a cutting board, waiting to be sliced. A pitcher of what he knew was sweet tea sat beside two ice-filled glasses. She dished up the casserole, some kind of pasta and seafood in a cream sauce, which made Caleb’s mouth water, before taking a seat across the table from him.
“Why so far away, baby girl?”
“You want to talk, and I don’t think we can if we’re sitting any closer together,” she said as she cut several slices from the bread loaf, taking one and sliding the cutting board toward him.
As he studied her, his cock began to reinflate. She was just so damn pretty. Dropping his gaze to his dinner, he took a breath. “You’re probably right.”
Though questions pressed at his brain for answers only she could give him, dinner demanded his attention first. They ate in silence as if each were hesitant to start what might turn into an uncomfortable conversation.
After eating two large helpings of the delicious casserole along with several slices of bread and his salad, Caleb put down his fork and pushed away his plate. He would not be able to eat like this often unless he found a way to burn off the calories. The sheriff would be all over him if he got fat and sloppy while on this supposedly easy assignment.
“Do you still want to talk?” Goldie asked, sounding nervous as she started carrying dishes to the sink.
“All I know about you is that your name is Goldie Pyrate and you claim we are life partners. Tell me everything about yourself,” he said as he finished stacking the dishes.
“Only if you tell me everything about you as well,” she said, glancing at him over her shoulder.
“Deal,” he said. “And after we deal with these, maybe we can take a walk and you can show me around the island?”
By the time they finished washing the dishes and ambled through town side by side, they had shared most of their life histories. She learned that he was an only child of parents who had died shortly after he finished high school, had joined the Marines for the law enforcement training before joining the sheriff’s department after spending three six-month tours in the Middle East out of his four-year enlistment.
He learned that she was the oldest of six cousins who had moved to the island eighteen years ago. She shared her dreams for the island, the resort, and her extended family, which appeared to include every person who lived on Pyrate Island. They found they both liked movies that made them think, mystery and thriller books, and all kinds of music from country to classical.
Though there were others out walking around town as well, neither he nor Goldie paid them any attention. Caleb found himself meeting a few men’s speculative glances and eased closer to the woman beside him. He met each man’s gaze squarely as he took her hand or wrapped his arm around her shoulders. He was not sure why, but he felt a need to make sure these men knew without a doubt that this woman was his.
Once they walked through the small collection of beach house rentals at the far end of town, they kept walking. Once on the hard sand just above the surf line, they turned and walked along the shore. Time seemed to come to a halt as they continued strolling, talking, and sharing bits and pieces of themselves and their lives.
When they reached a tall fence that crossed the beach and went well out into the water, he stopped when she tried to turn them to walk a path along the fence line.
“Why the fence?” he asked.
“Two-thirds of the island is privately owned. This is to keep guests from straying.”
“Who owns it?” Caleb asked, wanting to know everything about this woman. His curiosity was making him cross boundaries he normally would not go near.
“The pa…The Pyrate family trust.” She started to say something else then corrected herself. “Grandfather can explain it better than I can.”
“Uh-huh,” Caleb said then allowed her to lead him back toward town. The closer they got to his cottage, the slower Goldie walked, apparently reluctant for the evening to end.
He wondered if there was some little thing she was not telling him. Some secret to do with why she had just about fucked him on the wide-open roof of the ferry and why she had bitten his neck during sex at his house.
She came to a complete stop at his front walk.
“You are coming in, aren’t you?” he said, looking down at her.
Moonlight glinted off her black hair as she tilted her head back to meet his gaze. “Is that okay?” she asked, sounding unusually hesitant for a woman he had figured out was anything but.
“Do you need to be anywhere else tonight?” he asked as he wrapped his arm tighter around her shoulders and guided her up the walk to his porch.
She shook her head as they climbed the steps to the porch. “Cash is covering for me tonight. I’m free until the meeting tomorrow morning.”
“Good,” he said, opening the door and following her inside. “Then after you can tell me more about this instant recognition and life–slash–soul mate thing between us.”
Chapter 5
“After?” she asked as he closed and locked the door.
Turning, he pulled her into his arms. “Yeah, after. I have to do a thorough body search and check every inch of this body for identifying marks and to make sure you’re not packing any concealed weapons.”
“And what are you arresting me for, Deputy?” she asked, falling into his game easily.
“Haven’t made up my mind yet.”
Lifting her into his arms, he carried her down the hall and into the room where a queen-size bed waited for them. When he reached the side of the bed, he held her out over the mattress and dropped her. She giggled as she bounced, watching as he quickly stripped to his boxer shorts before he threw himself down beside her then half covered her body with his own. He kissed her long and deep before shifting and propping his head up on one elbow.
“Do I get to search you, too?” she asked, her giggles transforming into a long moan as he ran his free hand up her body to cup and massage first one breast and then the other. Her nipples popped to attention under her shirt as shivers of heat built in her core.
“We’ll see,” he said, leaning down and licking at her bottom lip. “But first I’ve got to search you to make sure you’re not concealing anything dangerous.”
With her helping as much as she could, he had her stripped bare in less than a minute. Then he spent many long minutes exploring every inch of her body. He licked and kissed every square millimeter of it before shifting to lie with his shoulders between her thighs.
She moaned when he licked his way between her pussy lips. The moan became a growl once he took her clit between his lips and gently batted it left and right then up and down with his tongue. When he gently nipped it with his teeth, she tried to sit up and reached for his shoulders. He pulled off the knot of nerves with a smacking sound then rose up on hands and knees. With one hand in the center of her chest, he toppled her back to lie flat on the bed.
“Sorry, baby girl, but I’m conducting this investigation, not you. Now cooperate or I’ll be forced to add resisting arrest to the charges,” he said as he lifted her legs from the bed and pushed them up until her thighs lay against her body.
Holding them there with a palm on the back of each thigh, he returned his attention to her center. Working his way from the top of her slit down to the open, wet entrance of her pussy, he showed a true mastery of the art of oral sex. Using fingers, teeth, and tongue, he licked and sucked at her, driving her to an orgasm the depth and intensity of which she had never felt before. Instead of allowing her to settle and relax, he continued playing, keeping her wound up and aroused.
When she thought she would go crazy if he did not do something, he licked one last time from pussy to clit to the top of her slit. Then he licked at her tattoo once again.
Lifting his head, he stared up at her between her shaking legs with a grin that sent a shiver through Goldie.
“Still with me, baby girl?”
Goldie was panting so hard that she could not speak. She nodded and lifted her arms, needing to hold him before she flew out into space from the wildness of the pleasure racing through her body.
Caleb shifted so he was kneeling at the apex of her thighs. Seeming to take pity on her, he took her right hand in his left and held it, giving her the skin-on-skin connection she so desperately needed. He used his other hand to drag the head of his cock up and down her centerline, the intimate touch keeping her on edge and in need.
She sucked in a sharp breath when he finally pressed the head of his cock against her pussy opening. In the next heartbeat, he slid completely into her. When his pelvis pressed against her ass cheeks, they groaned in harmony.
“More,” Goldie whined, trying to sit up in order to touch him more fully.
“What’s that, baby girl? Do you need a break?”
Goldie growled in denial as he pulled his cock completely free of her pussy’s hold. “Need. All. Of. You.”
She was shocked to hear the whining, wheedling, begging tone in her voice. Never had she allowed anyone to have as much control of her body and passions as Caleb had taken. With past lovers, few though they may have been, she had always, always, been in charge. But here and now, with Caleb, she did not mind that he was dominating her in ways she had never imagined before.
But would he want to be in charge out of bed as well? While she might be able to handle it, the pack would see it as her weakness if she submitted to him outside of the bedroom.
She cried out when Caleb eased back then thrust his hips forward even harder, filling her completely. He stilled with his pelvis pressed tight against her ass cheeks then leaned forward so he half covered her. His worn-denim-blue eyes were heavy-lidded and so damn sexy as they stared into hers, his expression serious but concerned.
“No thinking about other stuff,” he ordered gently.
“Mmmm, ’kay,” she answered just before all thought left her as he began a slow and easy motion of his hips.
She tried to move in counterpoint in order to fuck him back, but the position he had her in kept her from moving more than an inch or two in any direction. All she could do was try not to scream with a nerve-racking combination of frustration and arousal.
He stared down at her as his hips began to move faster. He looked so intently serious, almost angry, though she felt no negative emotions from him. All she felt from him was his arousal, which sent hers spiraling even tighter around her.
“More,” she whispered, her free hand lifting to him, needing more contact.
Instead of taking hold of it as he did her other, he guided her fingers to where their bodies joined. Without a word, he pressed her fingers into the valley between her pussy lips and over her clit. His hips picked up speed as he used her own fingers to stroke her sexual nerve center.
“Come again for me,” he demanded in a voice so deep she barely recognized it.
As if waiting for his order, her body responded at once. The orgasm that had been closing in on her broke, and she opened her mouth and silently cried out as every muscle in her body tightened in rhythmic waves.
She fought to keep her eyes open to watch him as his hips snapped several more times before he slammed deep into her and froze. His cock jerked and spasmed against her pussy tissues as he came, rolling her into another release, this one slightly less violent than the last.
She floated for a few seconds. Every muscle in her body slowly relaxed to the point she was not sure she could move even if the bed caught fire.
Caleb leaned completely over her and brushed a quick kiss across her lax lips. “Still with me?”
“Uh-huh,” she managed to voice after swallowing twice, licking her lips, and clearing her throat.
She moaned in protest when his cock slipped from her. He moved to her side and lowered her legs to the bed, causing her to gasp in half pain as the muscles and joints protested. Once she was straight, he fully reclined on the bed and pulled her over to cuddle against his side.
“Sleep, baby girl,” he murmured, brushing another kiss across her temple.
Goldie was too boneless and relaxed to argue. She snuggled closer, closed her eyes, and allowed sleep to carry her away.
* * * *
The ringing of a phone jerked Caleb from sleep, causing him to frown. His cell phone had a jazzy ringtone, not the harsh bell-like summons of an old-fashioned house phone. Opening his eyes, he looked around but did not recognize the room he found himself in. His body was relaxed and happy.
Then the warm body next to him shifted. “Answer the phone, Deputy.”
He looked at the woman with her head on his shoulder. Black silky hair covered her face, but memories flowed back. Pyrate Island. Goldie. The greatest sex of his life. And now an intrusive phone call.
Turning his head, he looked toward the side of the bed. There was an old-style black desk phone sitting on a nightstand that was obviously the source of the noise. Picking up the handset, he cleared his throat.
“Hello?”
“There are wolves running on the beach!” a high-pitched woman’s voice screamed into his ear.
Jerking the phone from his ear, Caleb stared at the phone, then at the dark-haired woman in bed beside him before looking once again around the room they were in. Was this all a bad dream brought on by a bad seafood casserole?
“Deputy! Did you hear me? There are wolves running on the beach!” the voice in the phone repeated loud enough f
or the woman to hear as well.
Bringing the phone back to his ear, Caleb asked the only question that came to mind. “Are you sure they’re wolves?”
“If they’re not wolves, then they are the biggest damn dogs I’ve ever seen,” the voice squealed, sounding offended that he should question her.
“Tell her to just ignore them. They won’t hurt her,” the woman in his arm stated.
“What?”
With a huffed sigh, Goldie lifted her head and looked across his chest. “Damn, it’s three o’clock in the morning.”
“What am I supposed to tell this woman about the wolves?” Caleb asked again as she dropped her head back to his chest.
“Gimme,” Goldie said, lifting a hand and reaching blindly for the phone.
Caleb placed it in her hand then had to grab the base before she pulled it off the nightstand and onto the floor. That dislodged Goldie from his side as she leaned up on one elbow. He immediately felt the loss all the way to his bones. That knowledge shocked him almost as much as the memory that he had actually demanded she stay after their last round of hot, hot, hot sex about midnight. Never had he felt such a need to hold a woman after sex.
What the fuck had she done to him?
“Miss, just ignore them. They won’t hurt you,” she said into the phone.
It took a few more minutes of assuring the caller that it really was safe for her and her new boyfriend to walk the beach after dark before the woman finally calmed down enough to hang up. Goldie finally handed him back the phone before settling her head on his chest again.
Caleb hung up the phone then angled his head to study the woman by his side. She seemed to be drifting back to sleep without a concern in the world.
“Sweetheart?” he asked, brushing the hair from her face.
“Mmmm,” she breathed without opening her eyes.
“Are there really wolves on the island?”
Goldie [Pyrate's Treasure 1] (Siren Publishing Classic) Page 4