“Shut up,” Devon interrupted, his tone as sharp as a rapier. “I’ve heard enough.”
He swallowed, licking his lips, looking with longing toward the decanter of scotch sitting by his favorite armchair. This fiasco was turning him into a goddamned drunk. And he hated drunks. His mother had been a drunk. And just look where that’d gotten her. And him, come to think of it…
“I agree with your plan,” Devon said, and his heart leapt with hope.
“Good. That’s good,” he wheezed. “And you’ll see, Devon. This will still work out.”
“You’re going to ensure it works out,” Devon said, his tone just this side of malicious. “Because you’re going to be the one to do it.”
“What? But—”
“This scheme started out as yours, and you’re going to be the one to finish it.”
“But, the police…They may want to question me some more, and—”
“I’ll supply you with a believable alibi,” Devon said. “Chartreuse just loves to spin tales of her Johns. She’ll come up with a great one for you.”
Chartreuse…One of Devon’s many gap-toothed whores. She was always meant to be his alibi if he came to need one. But he hadn’t really thought he’d ever need one until now. Because the police were likely to demand another interview, and when they couldn’t find him, he’d have to rely on Chartreuse to tell them he’d been with her the entire time. And considering the woman was about as skanky and rundown as the Southside project where she peddled her trade, it would absolutely ruin his reputation to be known as one of her clients.
Then again, if Devon killed him, he wouldn’t have a reputation to ruin…
“Fine,” he said through gritted teeth. “But I can’t very well take my own car. I can’t have traffic cameras catching me exiting the city.”
“I’ll supply you with a vehicle whose plates aren’t in the system.” Devon said and gave him the address where he could pick up the car. “It’ll be there in thirty minutes.”
He consulted the Rolex on his wrist; he had just enough time for one drink. So, he’d make it a big one.
“And one more thing,” Devon said.
“Yeah?”
“This is your last chance. You fuck this up, and you’re dead.”
***
Lake Michigan
3:10 a.m.
Well, if this wasn’t the sexiest, dirtiest, craziest thing she’d ever done—screwing Billy’s brains out—she didn’t know what was. And you know what? It felt divine. It was divinity. Like consecrated by the Gods or something…
Oh, sweet Lord in heaven…
She arched her back, biting the pillow beneath her cheek as Billy pumped into her from behind. His strokes were smooth and deep, his thighs rock hard against the backs of hers, his fingers doing something magical at the top of her sex where he had an arm wrapped around her.
The temperature inside the little cabin had jumped at least fifteen degrees since they’d started…well…going at each other she supposed was the best way to describe it. And, boy, oh boy, they should’ve done this years ago. She’d been an idiot to hold off. Because Billy was…well, he was Billy. Sexier, manlier, more physically inventive and more naturally talented than anybody she’d ever known. Yes, they should’ve done this…Oh, God.
She could no longer think. Because he was so deep inside her, pressing into her, now working her with short, hard thrusts, his middle and index fingers slipping over the bud of nerves at the top of her sex, and she was pushed up higher, pulled closer to the edge of the abyss. Then he lengthened his thrusts, stilled his fingers, and she moaned in frustration, shoving her butt back at him.
“Patience, sweetheart,” he growled, reaching up to feather his fingers across her nipple. “I’ll get you there.”
Oh, would he ever. She had no doubt of that. He’d get her there and then he’d get her there again. And again. And again. And…
“Billy,” she moaned his name when he leaned forward, his sweaty chest against her back, his hot breath whispering across her cheek as he murmured deliciously naughty things in her ear.
Billy…She glanced over her shoulder at the image of their bodies pressed together. His skin was deeply tanned compared to her fair complexion, the hairs on his legs and arms black and crinkly. And he looked big. Compared to her, he was big. His muscles huge and bulging, the side of his wonderfully perfect butt hollowing slightly each time he thrust into her. And with each long, lazy stroke she sank deeper into the infinite gulf of sensation. Her fingers tightened on the pillow, her teeth sinking into the weave of the fabric.
And suddenly, her release was rushing toward her. Her breath hitched in her throat as she waited for it, shamelessly reveling in it when it rushed over her in a huge swell of pulsing, aching climax.
“Ah, hell,” Billy cursed when her body clamped down on his. And it was obviously too much for him. He grabbed her hips, pumping into her violently until his own orgasm hit him, until he throbbed inside her. And then, together, they rode out the storm…
“You were supposed to wait,” he breathed in her ear once they’d both stopped blowing like a couple of winded racehorses.
“Did you,” she rasped, licking her lips and smiling at the weight of him along her back, pressing her into the mattress, “or did you not hear me when I said I’d stopped doing what other people tell me to do.”
“Mmm.” He rolled off her, and she muttered her disapproval as she heard the little snap as he pulled off the condom. She wasn’t looking, but she assumed he tossed it toward the small metal trashcan to join its compatriot.
“Come here,” he said, snaking an arm around her waist, forcing her to roll onto her side and face him. She threw a thigh over his legs, an arm over his chest, and buried her nose against his neck, just under his ear, inhaling deeply.
“Are you…sniffing me?” he asked, his chest rumbling beneath her arm and against her breast.
“Mmm-hmm,” she murmured. “Because you smell good.”
“I do?” he chuckled. “What do I smell like?”
She inhaled again, nipping his earlobe this time. He responded by rubbing a hand over her shoulder and down her arm, entwining their fingers. “You smell like Irish Spring soap. And leather. And sex. And…you.” Then she added, “And maybe a little bit like me.”
He growled, playing with her fingers. “I like the sound of that. Because that means you probably smell a little bit like me.”
“I’m sure you’re right,” she agreed. “We’ve marked each other without all that pesky lifting of a leg and urinating business.”
He snorted a laugh. “Well, whatever floats your boat, I guess.”
“That does not float my boat,” she assured him. “But speaking of markings,” she released his fingers to trace one of the star tattoos on his arm, “what do your tattoos mean? If they mean anything at all,” she was quick to add. “I totally understand if you got them just because they’re pretty or—”
“First of all,” he interrupted her, “my tattoos are not pretty.” She begged to differ. In her eyes, they were very pretty. But she assumed that description might’ve pricked his male ego. “They’re badass,” he finished. And, yep, assumption proved. “And secondly, they do have a meaning. But now that I know you think they’re…pretty,” his nose wrinkled when he said the word, “I’m not sure you want to hear what they stand for.”
“But I do,” she assured him, moving her finger to trace another star. “I do want to know.”
“The tale isn’t pretty,” he stressed the word.
“Oh, for Pete’s sake,” she huffed, slapping playfully at his shoulder. “I take it back. They’re not pretty. They’re hardcore, gangsta-hot, straight-up dope. Is that better?”
A laugh burst from him, all low and throaty. It sent a frisson of pleasure through her chest down to her belly. “Did you just utt
er the phrase straight-up dope? Where are we?” He glanced around the cabin. “1990?”
“Get to the point, Billy,” she huffed.
“Yes, ma’am.” He grinned at her when she pressed up on her elbow in order to scowl down at him. Too soon her expression smoothed. Because when Billy grinned like that, all playful and teasing, she could see remnants of that young petty officer she’d fallen in love with. She nipped his stubbled jaw for good measure before re-tucking her head beneath his chin so she could resume tracing his tattoos.
“Each of these tattoos represents an explosive device I successfully disarmed,” he told her. Which only had her pressing up again, her eyes skimming over his right arm where at least twenty-five colorful, multi-sized star tattoos ran from his shoulder to just beneath his elbow. The opposite arm sported what appeared to be the same amount.
Holy moly. Fifty times…at least fifty times, Billy put himself in the middle of an armed bomb…er explosive device, or whatever he calls them. Her mouth dried at the thought, at the magnitude of the danger he’d lived through, at the extent of what he’d accomplished, and the untold lives he’d undoubtedly saved.
“Geez Louise, Billy,” she breathed, searching his half-lidded, lazy eyes. “Were you—” She stopped herself, because the question she thought to pose sounded silly, even in her own head.
“Go ahead,” he encouraged her. “Ask whatever you want.”
“It’s stupid,” she assured him, shaking her head. “I already know the answer.”
“The answer to what?” he smiled, cocking his head on the pillow.
“To whether or not you were scared.”
“And was I?”
“Well, of course!” She threw a hand in the air. “You disarmed bombs for a living. A lot of bombs!” Her eyes flew over the myriad tattoos on his arms.
He grabbed her hand and flattened it against his chest. She could feel the steady beat of his heart. “You might be the only one who believes I was scared,” he told her, and she frowned at him.
“How is that possible?”
“Well, I’ve been told that when I’m in the middle of a mission, or a bomb, or anything particularly hair-raising, I get really still. And really, really calm.”
“Well, that just means you’re internalizing your fear,” she told him. “Which is undoubtedly why you’re so good at what you do, steady hands and all, but it’s also probably why you swill Pepto-Bismol like it’s going out of style.”
He barked a laugh. “Is that your official diagnosis, Dr. Phil?”
“Is it the wrong one?” she asked, lifting a brow.
“No,” he admitted, a half-smile playing at his wonderful lips.
“Hmm.” She nodded, once again tucking her head beneath his chin, reveling in the comforting sound of his heavy heartbeat. “And is that how you got your nickname? Wild Bill? Because you were crazy to have gone up against all those explosives?”
“Nah.” The word rasped in his chest and in her ear. “I got that name before ever shipping out. It was a hold-over from my last few months of SEAL training.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean I went a little crazy there for a while. Drinking too much. Driving too fast. Pushing the boundaries with my superior officers. I was living on the wild side of life. Hence, the nickname.”
“But why?” she asked, wondering if, perhaps, he’d started to regret his decision to be a Navy SEAL. If he’d started to second-guess—
“Why do you think, Eve?” His voice was suddenly quiet, subdued, and her breath hitched in her lungs like she’d run out of oxygen on a deep dive.
“B-because of me?” she asked, pressing up to stare down at him. But she already knew the truth in her heart. And it killed her to think of the pain she’d caused him, to think of the career she might have caused him to lose had he ever stepped over the line as opposed to simply pushing it.
Well, that was just one more reason for her to hate herself for what she’d done…
When he opened his mouth to answer, she slapped her palm over his lips, shaking her head, tears pressing behind her eyes. “Don’t answer that,” she said. “I already know what you’ll say. And I’m sorry, Billy. I’m so—”
“Eve.” He moved her hand away. “Stop apologizing, okay?”
She shook her head. “Nope,” she sniffled. “I don’t think I can do that.”
He sighed, pulling her down to press her cheek against his chest. “Well then,” he said, “I’ll just have to distract you.”
“Distract me?” she asked, watching as he took her hand, curling all her fingers into a fist except for her pointer finger, which he straightened and used like a pencil, tracing one of the tattoos on the inside of his lean hip.
“Mmm-hmm,” he murmured, dropping a kiss into her crown as his rough palm smoothed over her hip. “A man’s got to do what a man’s got to do.”
“The Grapes of Wrath?” she asked distractedly when he released her hand so she could continue the tracing on her own. She caught her lips between her teeth as his manhood twitched and swelled to throbbing, violent life.
“A bastardized version of it,” he whispered, reaching up to thumb her nipple. It sprang to instant, aching attention.
And though there was a part of her that still felt close to tears, a part of her that felt that even if she apologized a thousand more times it still wouldn’t be enough, there was another part of her that burned at the thought of Billy taking her again.
And he and John Steinbeck were certainly right about one thing. A man had to do what a man had to do. But a woman had to do what a woman had to do, too. So, lifting her head, she closed her mouth over his, breathing in his breath, reveling in his taste, letting herself get lost in him…
Chapter Twenty-three
Lake Michigan
7:15 a.m.
Kisses.
It was the most wonderful way to wake up. Sweet, delicate kisses drifting down Bill’s stomach toward the erection that was straining beneath the covers…
When Eve got to his bellybutton, she stopped, dipping her tongue inside, and his toes curled. He threw back the comforter, pushed her inky hair away from her forehead, and the soft light filtering in through the portholes highlighted the glint in her gorgeous sapphire eyes as she looked up at him.
“Good morning,” she breathed, catching her bottom lip between her teeth.
“Indeed it is,” he told her, grinning, loving the half-smile pulling at one corner of her mouth. “And it’ll be even better if you continue what you’re doing.”
“What I’m doing?” She lifted a brow, playing the coquette to perfection. “Oh, you mean this?” She opened her hot, wet mouth, and laved the tip of his erection with the soft, raspy pad of her tongue.
“Mmm-hmmm…” He fisted his hands in her hair, thrusting his hips upward just slightly. Sweet Mother Mary, have mercy. “That’s exactly what I m-mean.” And just as he was about to settle in—because, come on, the only thing better than waking up to soft kisses on his stomach was waking up to a blow-job; he was a guy, after all—the softly rocking sailboat suddenly rolled violently to the port side, nearly tossing them off the bed. Then, the vessel heaved to the starboard, and this time Bill did slide off the mattress, slamming against the teakwood decking on his back.
“Holy crap!” Eve yelled. He pulled himself to his knees in time to watch her jump from the rumpled bed and grab onto the doorframe separating the berth from the rest of the small cabin. A sizzle of white light blazed through the portholes followed almost immediately by a deafening crash of thunder. “We’ve sailed into a thunderstorm!”
And yeah, he didn’t need to be told. The fact that every hair on his body was standing on end pretty much made that a foregone conclusion. Talk about a total soft-on. For future reference, the best way to lose chub? Sail into a thunderstorm and get tossed off the bed onto
your ass.
“I, uh, I forgot to check the NOAA weather forecast last night,” he admitted as the boat heaved again. Scrambling to his feet, he grabbed his discarded swim trunks with one hand while steadying himself on the mattress with the other.
“We were a little busy,” she said, turning, stumbling down the length of the cabin to retrieve her bikini bottoms as the vessel bucked again. The sky opened up and rain pounded against the hull, creating a constant, dull roar.
Yeah, busy. They’d certainly been that. And even with the vessel being tossed around like a cork on the ocean, he still took the time to appreciate the sight of Eve scrambling into those skimpy red bottoms while he hopped into his shorts. Shoving his cell phone into one Velcro pocket, he staggered out to the galley in time to see her slip an orange life vest over her T-shirt. Handing him a vest, he pulled it over his head just as the humming engine suddenly caught, choked, rumbled unsteadily for a bit, and finally sputtered and died.
“Shit,” he cursed. “That can’t be another rope. We can’t be that unlucky.”
Although, in all reality, considering how things had been going for Eve lately, he wouldn’t lay down any money on that last statement.
“No.” She shook her head, her eyes wide. “It’s probably zebra mussels. With the water all churned up like this—”
“What kind of mussels?” he asked as the boat took another violent roll to the port side. He banged his hip against the table and caught Eve as she slammed against him.
“Hurry,” she said, hastily pushing away, “we have to check the output port.”
He followed her up the short cabin stairs. When she opened the door to the deck, the wind ripped the thing from her hands. It slammed against the side of the cabin—crash!—splintering the wood and cracking the porthole window. Rain immediately deluged them, soaking them to the bone and pelting against any exposed skin like tiny, sharp knives as the boat caught a wave broadside and tipped precariously. Frothing gray water rushed over the deck, pouring into the open cabin and freezing Bill’s legs from the knees down as he struggled to retain his balance.
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