Summer at Seaside Cove

by Jacquie D'Alessandro

  “You’re welcome. I liked Liz very much. We had a great time on our walk to the market and it turns out we have a lot in common, including drama-prone mothers. Some of the stories she told me about her mom’s wild, single lifestyle since divorcing her dad was enough to make my curly hair curlier. Definitely gave me a whole new appreciation of my mother, who’s a veritable saint in comparison.”

  Nick nodded. “Always good to be reminded that no matter what your problems are, someone else’s are worse.”

  “Very wise words.”

  “Did we just agree again?”

  “Yes, but don’t let it go to your head. Liz reminds me of my best friend Kate. They both have that easygoing, friendly warmth about them.”

  “Liz said the same thing about you.” He shot her a grin. “I told her she wouldn’t think you were so easygoing if she’d seen you the morning after the roof had leaked on your head all night.”

  “The fact that your lifeless body didn’t wash up on the beach after the roof had leaked on my head all night proves how easygoing I can be.”

  Nick laughed. “Actually, that’s pretty much what Liz told me.” He reached for the bottle of water he’d taken from Kevin’s fridge before they left. After taking a long swallow, he said, “Every time I’m around them, I—” He stopped and pressed his lips together, suddenly feeling foolish. And unsure why he felt compelled to share with her the unsettling thought that had niggled at him ever since he moved to Seaside Cove and saw Kevin and Liz frequently.

  “You what?”

  He drew a deep breath. What the hell. If she thought he was nuts, so much the better. Might help him keep that let’s get naked mantra to himself.

  “Whenever I see Kevin and Liz together, I’m really happy for them. Honest to goodness, bone-deep happy. Yet at the same time, I’m … envious. Seeing them makes me want what they have. A home. A family. Someone who looks at me like I’m the best thing she’s ever seen, and who I look at the same way. There are times when the three of us will all be talking and laughing when they’ll suddenly look at each other and …”

  “It’s as if you’re not there? Like you’ve disappeared?”

  “Exactly.”

  Jamie nodded. “I know what you mean. Same thing happens to me with Kate and her husband, Ben. They got married five months ago and are as happy as ducks in a pond. I’m totally thrilled for them, love being with them, yet sometimes no matter how much fun we’re having, no matter how much I love them and know they love me, a tiny part of me feels like an interloper.”

  “A third wheel,” Nick said, and realized she did indeed know exactly what he meant.

  “Yes! And not because of anything they’ve said or done. It just all stems from wanting what they have. That intimate, emotional, profound connection. For a while that envy made me very uncomfortable. But I finally realized that just because you desire something, it doesn’t mean you don’t want someone else to have it. That sort of envy isn’t bad because it doesn’t take anything away from the people it’s directed toward.” She reached out and briefly touched his arm. “It’s okay to want things for yourself, Nick.”

  That whisper of a touch rocketed a shocking flare of heat through him. Jesus, she’d barely touched him, yet he felt as if she’d set him on fire. What the hell would happen if she really touched him? Really put her hands on him—like she meant it?

  Stupid question. He knew damn well what would happen. Her touch did to him what a lit match did to gasoline.

  Her words swirled around in his head, twisting until they applied only to her and how she made him feel. Battering him with truths he really didn’t want to acknowledge. Like the fact that what he desired, what he wanted for himself right now was her. In his arms. Naked. Under him. Over him. Like that he wanted her, and didn’t want anyone else to have her.

  No, he definitely didn’t want to acknowledge those things. But damn it, that didn’t make them any less true.

  “I see one of those twenty-four-hour convenience stores coming up just past the next intersection,” she said, jerking him from his unsettling thoughts. “Would you mind stopping for just a moment?”

  “Sure. No problem.”

  He pulled into the parking lot and shifted the truck into park. “I’ll be right back,” she said, unhooking her seat belt.

  She opened the door and the interior light blinked on, revealing that her cheeks resembled a setting sun. “Everything okay?”

  “Uh, yeah. I just remembered I need some … girl stuff. Be right back.”

  She closed the door and hurried into the store. Nick dragged his hands through his hair and shifted in an attempt to relieve the strangulation occurring in his jeans. Damn. He’d known bringing her to Kevin’s place wasn’t a good idea, but he’d thought about her constantly while he’d been away and hadn’t been able to resist asking her to come along.

  Plus, part of him had hoped she’d bomb out with his friends. That Kevin and Liz wouldn’t like her. That Kevin would give him the “bro, this girl is not for you” look. That Liz would subtly suggest fixing him up with an acquaintance—her way of letting him know that Jamie was getting the thumbs-down. That Jamie would be standoffish with them and the baby.

  But instead, she’d received thumbs-up all around. She’d charmed Kev with her damn delicious brownies, bonded with Liz like glue to paper, and both Kevin and Liz had privately told him they liked Jamie a lot and hoped he’d bring her back.

  And instead of being standoffish with the baby, she’d gotten grass-stained palms and knees playing with her on the lawn. Which meant his ingenious “my best friends will hate her, giving me the incentive I badly need to banish her from my thoughts so I can concentrate on something other than her” plan had royally failed.

  Which confirmed his earlier thought that he was royally screwed.

  He’d tried to stay away from her. And failed.

  He’d tried to stop thinking about her. And failed.

  He’d tried to stop wanting her. And failed.

  The store’s automatic doors slid open and she exited carrying a plastic bag. His heart tripped over itself at the sight of her and he groaned at the ridiculous reaction, while let’s get naked again drummed through his head.

  Damn it, he needed a new plan. And fast. But after spending the day in her company, his good intentions were shot to hell. As was his will power. And his memory, because although there were at least ten thousand reasons he didn’t want to get involved with her, at the moment he couldn’t recall even one.

  She climbed into the truck and he swallowed a groan of longing when he caught a whiff of her cookie-scented skin. “Get what you needed?” he asked, gripping the wheel to keep from grabbing her.

  “Yes. You okay?”

  “Yup. Great.” He pulled out of the parking lot and prayed he’d come up with a plan—or at least recall why getting involved with Jamie Newman was a bad idea—during the remaining ten minutes of the drive home.

  Jamie didn’t speak, and Nick forced himself to shut the hell up and concentrate on jogging his memory. It kicked in just as they crossed the bridge leading to the island. She’s on the rebound, it reminded him. And she’s bossy. And a pest. A picky pest. A cat person. And a princess. Not to mention she’s leaving in a matter of weeks and lives seven hundred miles away.

  Relief filled Nick. Right. So bossy. Such a pest. Irritatingly picky. Would surely end up with even more cats. A total princess. Completely geographically undesirable.

  Then he frowned. Actually, she wasn’t really bossy. She was … assertive. And confident. And he actually liked those traits in a woman. Damn.

  And really, she wasn’t a pest at all. In fact, she was pretty much the opposite of a pest. And as for picky, well, it was more that she paid attention to details. And he liked that, too. Double damn.

  And he could hardly find fault with someone who loved animals, especially someone who loved his dog and who his dog worshipped. And Nick couldn’t deny he liked Cupcake. Triple damn.
<
br />   And those grass stains she’d gotten on her knees today were just further proof that she wasn’t a princess at all. Quadruple damn.

  She’s on the rebound.

  Well that at least was true. As was the fact that her stay in Seaside Cove was only temporary. Except he’d completely forgotten why that mattered. Which meant he’d run out of reasons not to give in to the fierce desire that had plagued him for weeks and at this moment was choking him.

  Several minutes later he pulled into Southern Comfort’s carport. He turned off the ignition and headlights, plunging them into shadowy darkness. After unclicking his seat belt, he turned toward her. And saw she’d unfastened her seat belt and turned toward him. And was regarding him through very serious eyes.

  Before he could snatch her into his arms and put out this damn fire she’d started inside him, she said in a quiet voice, “I enjoyed meeting your friends.”

  “I think you just enjoyed getting away from your mom and Alex.”

  “I can’t deny that was a side benefit, but the truth is I had a great time. With them. And with you. I know I said this wouldn’t happen again, but …” She leaned forward and lightly brushed her mouth over his. Before he could react, she’d leaned back. “Thank you.”

  His heart, which had stuttered to a halt, slammed against his ribs hard and fast enough to bruise them. “You’re welcome. But that isn’t what you said wouldn’t happen again. This is.” He slid one hand around her nape, pulled her toward him, and covered her mouth with his in the deep, hungry kiss he’d been aching to give her since the moment their first kiss had ended.

  His fingers fisted in her hair, and he shifted closer, cursing the console that separated them. One of them moaned—who the hell knew who?—and her lips parted. Nick didn’t hesitate. He stroked his tongue into the luscious, silky heaven of her mouth and kissed her with all the pent-up want and frustration that had been building inside him for weeks.

  Christ, she tasted good. Even better than he remembered. She opened her mouth wider, an invitation that drained the remaining blood above his neck to settle in his groin. And just like the last time he’d kissed this woman, his control vanished, filling him with a dark, raw hunger unlike anything he’d ever before experienced. A visceral, gut-wrenching need that made him want to fling her over his shoulder, drag her off to his cave, and simply devour her until they both passed out from sheer exhaustion. Then wake her up and start all over again.

  Somewhere in the back of his blood-deprived brain it registered that he was exhibiting a definite lack of finesse here, but he couldn’t stop. Not yet. And based on the way her impatient hands tunneled through his hair, then raced downward to slip beneath his T-shirt and glide up his back, she had no complaints.

  His fingers tightened in her hair, tilting back her head, and he dragged his mouth down her neck, lightly sucking on her delicious skin. The scent of cookies filled his head—like he needed anything else to make him crave her.

  He ran his free hand down her chest to cup her breast through her tank top, then slipped his fingers beneath the stretchy material to pluck her hard nipple. She gasped and arched into his hand, whispering his name in a long, husky groan that raised his temperature a good ten degrees.

  He dragged his tongue back up her delicious neck, then leaned back, breathing hard. With one hand still tangled in her tousled curls and the other still palming her breast, he ran his avid gaze over her moist, parted lips and closed eyes. Her ragged, uneven breaths matched his and she looked undone and hard-nippled and sexy as hell.

  He waited for her to open her eyes, and when she did, heat rippled through him at how glazed they looked.

  He had to swallow to locate his voice. “Just so we’re clear, that’s what you said wouldn’t happen again.”

  She moistened her lips, a gesture that tightened his already aching groin. “I stand corrected.”

  He slipped his hand from her tank top and brushed back the sun-streaked curls clinging to her flushed cheek. She leaned into his touch and released a breathy sigh. “Didn’t we agree at some point that we weren’t going to do this?”

  Nick traced her plump lower lip with his fingertip. “You said it. I never agreed.”

  “Do you remember why I said it?”

  “Not a damn clue.”

  “I was hoping that if we did kiss again, it wouldn’t be as good as the first time.”

  “You saying it wasn’t?”

  “Yes. It was better.” She grabbed his wrist and sucked his finger into her mouth.

  Nick drew in a quick, hard breath that came out decidedly shaky, then ended on a groan when she swirled her tongue around his fingertip. The hell with getting out of the truck. He wanted, needed his hands on her now. Besides, he was too damn hard to walk.

  He reached for her, intent on dragging her over the console, when Godiva stuck her head between them and panted hot doggie breath in their faces. Nick glared at his pet, whose tail thwapped against the leather of the backseat while her expression clearly said, Hey guys! Whatcha doin’? Can I play? Please? I wanna play! Right after I pee! I gotta pee! Wow, have I got to pee! And I’m hungry! What’s for dinner? Please, oh please, tell me it’s dinnertime!

  “Maybe cats are the way to go,” he muttered. He twisted around and opened the back door. Godiva catapulted from the truck and dashed to her favorite spot on the patchy lawn and commenced with her sniff-every-blade-of-grass ritual. Nick watched her for several seconds, taking the time to gather his badly scattered wits, and suddenly remembered the big reason, the real reason he couldn’t get involved with her.

  He turned to face her and dragged his hands down his face. “We both know where that kiss was leading.”

  She nodded. “I was about to jump on you like a Dalmatian on a fire truck.” To prove her point she swung her leg over the console with the agility of an Olympic gymnast. A heartbeat later she was straddling him, her pelvis pressed against his erection, her hands sifting through his hair. His hands cupped her ass and hauled her tighter against him.

  “You’d jump on me … yeah—right after I stripped you bare so I could lick you like an ice cream cone,” he said, and proved his point by slowly dragging his tongue down the side of her neck.

  She tilted her head to give him easier access. “God. You really are a sweet-talker. Literally. Can I hold you to that?”

  “Absolutely. But there’s a problem.”

  “This would be an extremely bad time to confess you really are a hit man.”

  “Not a hit man, and unfortunately not a good Boy Scout.”

  She leaned back and frowned. “Meaning what?”

  “I’m not prepared.”

  She rocked herself against his erection. “Feels like you’re very prepared to me.”

  He actually felt his eyes glaze over. “But not fully prepared. At least not until I hit up a drugstore.”

  She set her hands on his chest, pushed him back, and looked at him with an unreadable expression. “You don’t have any condoms?”

  “No.” Damn it to hell and back.

  “You mean you don’t have one handy, or you don’t have any in the house?”

  “None. Anywhere.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I haven’t been having sex and I wasn’t expecting”—he gave her denim-clad ass a gentle squeeze—“this. You.”

  “But you always use a condom—right?”

  “Of course. Always. You?”

  “Always. So tell me—how long have you not been having sex?”

  “A while. Not since I moved here.”

  Her brows shot up. “Really?”

  “Really. Between working on Southern Comfort and helping out Kevin, I’ve been busy. Getting laid wasn’t a priority.”

  “That’s a sentence I never thought I’d ever hear any man utter.”

  He huffed out a laugh. “Well, it wasn’t a priority until you showed up.” He shoved aside the disturbing realization that he hadn’t wanted anyone but her since she’d
shown up.

  “Still, it seems you’d at least have a supply of condoms on hand. You know, in case you got lucky.”

  “Sweetheart, the only store I’ve been to in the last four months besides the Piggly Wiggly and Milton’s Bait Shop is Home Depot, and to the best of my knowledge, they don’t sell condoms at Home Depot.”

  “They don’t sell them at the Piggly Wiggly?”

  “Don’t know. Never looked.”

  “As for Home Depot—it seems like they might carry them in the plumbing aisle. Or in hardware. You know, with all the screws and nails.”

  “You’re killing me.” He leaned forward and lightly scraped his teeth over the outline of one hard nipple pressing against her tank top. She gasped and arched her back, and Nick cursed his poor planning. “Much as I’d like to continue this here and now, I need to find an open drugstore.”

  Again she pushed him back and looked at him through glittering eyes. “You might not have been a good Boy Scout, but I was a very good Girl Scout.” She held up the plastic bag she’d carried from the convenience store and swayed it like a pendulum between them.

  “What’s in there?”

  “Condoms,” she said. “The party pack. Thirty-six of ’em. I’m a firm believer that a girl should always bring her own. Just in case.”

  Nick skimmed one hand into her hair and dragged her forward until their mouths nearly touched. “Thirty-six—that should get us through the night,” he whispered against her lips.

  “Still think I’m a pest?”

  “Hell, no. I think you’re …” Magnificent. Incredible. Sexy as hell. And you’ve got me so hard I can barely think straight. “A genius.”

  “There are some advantages to being detail oriented.”

  “Obviously.” He slipped the fingers of one hand under the hem of her denim shorts and explored the lacy edge of her underwear. “There’re plenty of details on you I’d like to—”

  “Orient?”

  “Among other things. How about you and me and our thirty-six new best friends head inside?”

  “I thought you’d never ask.” Then she frowned and her expression turned serious. “But first …” She hesitated, pulled in what seemed like a bracing breath, then continued, “You told me after our first kiss that you liked me a little. You also said I should give complete honesty a try, so here goes: I like you, too. More than a little.” Then she leaned forward and whispered in his ear, “And just so you know—you had me at ‘lick you like an ice cream cone.’ ”