Fool's Gold (A sexy funny mystery/romance, Cottonmouth Book 2)

by Skully, Jennifer

  That done, she held out her hand. He plucked another, which she used to wipe the mascara smudges from beneath her eyes.

  “Trust a woman to have the tissues handy,” he said, hoping to make her smile a little.

  She did. Softly. Too sadly. “Sappy love stories always make me cry.”

  She’d admitted that, and he’d witnessed. She’d almost cried when Dorothy sang “Over the Rainbow.”

  Balling the tissues, she put them on the table, then smoothed the flat of her hand down his chest. “I got your shirt all wet, and it’s covered with lipstick.”

  “It’ll dry, and lipstick won’t show on the black.”

  “You’re awfully understanding.”

  Right. The most he’d been able to do was let her cry in his arms.

  “Thanks for letting me get that out.”

  She was thanking him for doing nothing? “It was my pleasure.” He’d almost broken down himself. First Maggie, now Simone. He felt beaten to a pulp.

  Her tangy shampoo tickled his nose, her bare skin against his arm heated him, and the gentle swell of her breasts suddenly seemed to mesmerize him. When she cried, he’d offered the comfort of touch. Now, with her lying across him, her breath caressing his neck, his body started doing some thinking of its own.

  Shit. Maybe the right place, but certainly not the right time. He patted her arm in a hopefully comforting gesture, then tried to ease her off his lap.

  She burrowed deeper, her face to his throat, her arms wrapped around his neck. He didn’t have the heart to push her away, and instead pulled her closer still. God, she smelled good. In a world that had suddenly gone sour, she was fresh and clean and everything his mind and body craved.

  A few more moments, that’s all he’d take, one more deep breath to fill himself with her scent. He nuzzled her hair, then grazed her forehead with his lips. She tasted salty. In all that sobbing, she’d gotten her tears all over herself.

  Damn, she was beautiful. She took him to a place where death, murder, pain, guilt, and anger didn’t exist. There was only her woman scent and her baby-soft skin.

  Brax cupped her throat, tracing the line of her jaw with his fingers, then down to test her pulse. It was racing. So was his. And he knew he would never be able to resist her.

  * * * * *

  Simone lifted her head. She couldn’t have said whether she raised her face or he tipped her chin, but their lips met. Mouths closed. Gentle. Sweet.

  She felt as if she’d been alone and untouched forever. His taste was a balm to her soul. Just a kiss, just one.

  She threaded her fingers through his hair, massaging his scalp. Then licked his lower lip. Only this. She wouldn’t ask for more. He groaned, tightened his hold on her, and opened his mouth to her tongue. He bent her over his arm, kissing her with his lips, his teeth, and his tongue, his hands at her back, his chest to her breasts, and his erection riding her hip.

  Okay, so that was a little bit more than she’d planned, but God, she could almost believe he kissed her with everything he had. Reverently. In a way she’d never been kissed except in her fantasies.

  Her breasts rose and fell against his chest. Leaving her lips, he pulled back, his hot gaze touching her flushed skin. He trailed a finger down the slope of breast to the scooped neckline of her T-shirt.

  Please, please, please, more.

  But there he stopped. Waiting for her permission. Gentleman Brax. Darn it. She almost wished he’d do it, touch her, so she didn’t have to make a decision.

  What if she never got another chance? She’d die a shriveled prune. Living on fantasy didn’t cut it. Not now. Maybe tomorrow, she could return to her Goldstone way of life. Right now, she needed Brax.

  “Second base,” she whispered. Then she guided his hand to her breast, cupping his palm over her tight nipple.

  It wasn’t enough. It was too much.

  “Jesus,” he breathed against her hair.

  Lying back against the arm of the sofa, she offered herself like a meal. “I know I’m selfish, but I don’t care right now. Please touch me.” She was almost beyond thinking.

  He smoothed a hand across the flesh above her T-shirt. “What happened to heightening the anticipation until we’re crazy?”

  What had happened to her sense of decorum? Poof, gone.

  She bit her lip, wriggling in his lap. “This is crazy. We shouldn’t. I shouldn’t make you. I know Carl’s gone, and Maggie’s hurting terribly. I know it’s wrong to want this.” Wrong, yes, but she steered his hand once more to her breast, rubbing his finger back and forth against the tight, aching bud.

  His blue eyes darkened, blazed with heat. “Don’t think about the rest. Not right now.” His body surged beneath her. “Just think about how goddamn much I want you.”

  His words. They were almost out of control. The way she felt.

  Then he pulled aside the lace and cotton of her bra and bent his head to take her in his mouth. Crying out, she held him to her. He sucked her like candy, searching for the sweet center. Cradling her shoulders against his arm, he plumped her breast, stroking the underside with his thumb, its texture rough, but oh so sweet. He soothed her skin with his fingers, then took her nipple with his mouth and tongue.

  She almost shouted with the pleasure, only at the last moment clamping down with her teeth on her lip. Raking both hands through his hair, she used the tips of her fingers, her nails. A soft moan fell from her lips.

  He found the strip of exposed flesh above her waistband and dipped his finger into her belly button. It tickled. She jumped, her stomach quivering with the anticipation. Fire exploded inside, consumed her.

  He threw his head back and held her down, rocking his cock against her. “I want third base.”

  “I don’t remember what it is.” But she wanted it, whatever it was.

  He stilled, his gaze roaming her stomach. “My hand in your panties.”

  “Yes, please.” Her voice came as a tremulous whisper.

  Shimmying, she pulled up her skirt for him, baring her need and her desire as blatantly as she revealed the white thong riding her hips and intimately cupping her sex. “Want me, Brax,” she whispered. “Want me badly. Until you feel like you’re gonna scream if you don’t have me.”

  With a fingertip, he traced her along the cotton panty, pushing deeper until he found the nub of her clitoris. A hum vibrated in her throat, and her head fell back, exposing her neck to his lips. He nipped, then licked, still playing her through her panties. Then he palmed her, shoving his hand between her thighs. Tightening her legs, trapping him, she soundlessly begged for more.

  “Christ, you’re hot down there.”

  She opened her eyes to his deep blue gaze. He was so beautiful. “Uh-huh.”

  Dragging his fingers over her once more, he teased the skin along the elastic line across her belly.

  She lost every last one of her inhibitions as well as her fear. “It doesn’t count as third base,” she murmured, “unless you’re inside my panties.”

  “What’s it called when it’s outside the panty?”

  “It’s called the shortstop tease, and it isn’t a nice thing to do to a lady.” She wasn’t a lady, not the way he made her feel, not the way she wanted to cry out. But she didn’t care. She wanted to feel good for a little while.

  He stroked back and forth, back and forth, until she thought she’d die if he didn’t delve beneath the darn elastic. She wanted all of him.

  He wasn’t going to reject her. At least not yet, not until...later. She’d deal with it then.

  He grinned down at her. “Are you sure it’s not nice?”

  Her skin tingled, and her body heated, moistened, readied. She became one of those heroines in her stories. She licked her lips, wriggling in hopes his fingers might slip beneath the panty line. “I guess it’s nice. But it could be a whole lot nicer.”

  “Isn’t the anticipation better? The wanting, the needing, like your whole body’s going to explode. The feeling that you’ll d
ie if I don’t put my fingers inside your sweet, hot, wet—”

  She slapped her hand over his mouth. “I think you’re throwing my own words back at me.” Slightly altered, of course. But oh my God, it was how she felt.

  Pulling her hand away, he grinned, like a feral animal, all white teeth and predatory eyes. “Yeah. Ain’t it great?”

  It was. She ached for his touch from the inside out. On its own, her body moved in rhythm to his stroke, building toward climax with nothing more than his heady male scent, the tactile memory of his mouth on her breast, and the rough texture of his big, beautiful hand against her stomach.

  Don’t think, just do.

  She grabbed the back of his neck and pulled his head down until his mouth touched hers. “It’s perfect.” She nipped his lip. “Make it more perfect. Please. Pretty please.” She shouldn’t beg. Begging wasn’t done. It suggested a girl was about to lose control.

  Simone couldn’t help herself.

  She probed his mouth with her tongue, greedy for his taste, and pressed her breasts hard to his chest. Her heart raced, and she gave voice to the breathless pant of approaching orgasm.

  He tugged on her hip, working the panties down, while she wriggled, helping him and driving herself crazy with all the squirming.

  Tingles like fireworks sparklers accompanied his touch all the way back up her calf and thigh. He slid a finger over her clitoris, then deep inside her, and she went off like a Fourth of July display. Thighs clamped, inner muscles contracting, spasming, she cried into his mouth with unladylike abandon. He took it all, took her kiss, made it his own, drank in her screams, devoured her like the predator he was. With short, sharp movements of his hand, he forced her to ride the edge until she trembled with orgasmic exhaustion.

  Then he held her, caressing her lips, nuzzling her cheek with his nose, and soothing her tensed limbs with gentle strokes. She was warm and tingly and snug and...

  What had she done?

  Had she screamed? Sort of. Against his lips. Which was better than having him put his hand over her mouth. But still. She’d been in a fugue state. The sobbing, the crying, then his touch, his kiss. She’d lost her mind.

  This was the problem with letting hormones and emotions take over. She didn’t care how she behaved while she was under the influence, not until it was all over. Then splat, she came down off the high.

  She tugged at the bottom of her skirt to at least cover her pantyless state. “Well, that was incredibly embarrassing.”

  Brax kissed her eyelids. “That was heaven.”

  “You barely touched me, and I totally lost control.” She’d screamed. She closed her eyes, too embarrassed to look at him.

  He rubbed his nose to hers. “This is very unmanly to admit, and I probably shouldn’t, but I’ve never made a woman orgasm like that in my life.”

  “That’s why it’s embarrassing.”

  He held her chin. “Look at me.”

  “I can’t.”

  He shook her lightly. She opened her eyes to his laser-bright blues.

  “That was too fucking incredible for words,” he whispered, his hot, husky voice caressing her.

  She blinked. “Oh.”

  “I want to make you do it again, but this time I want to be inside you.”

  No one had ever taken everything she had to give and asked for more. No words had ever made her feel so special. He couldn’t possibly mean it. Her heart beat faster and her eyes clouded up. “But it was so unladylike.”

  He gave a short bark of disbelieving laughter. “Don’t tell me your mother dictated orgasm etiquette to you.”

  Not exactly. “Why would you bring up my mother at a time like this?”

  “I swear I heard her voice coming out of your mouth.”

  She gasped. He hadn’t figured out who her mother was, had he? “You’ve never even heard her voice.” She worried her lip. “Have you?”

  “I know a quote when I hear one.”

  “Oh.” She squirmed. It wasn’t a quote exactly, more like an overall rule of permissible behavior. “Nothing, including sex, should ever be done to excess.”

  He laughed outright this time, throwing his head back. She wanted to lick his throat.

  “There is definitely one thing that should be enjoyed to excess, and that’s an orgasm.” He tipped her chin, holding her gaze. “The world would be a better place if everyone came like you just did.”

  Oh my God. He didn’t care she was a screamer. He wasn’t like her ex-fiancé. He resembled one of the heroes in her fantasies, actually enjoying that she was exuberant and excessive. She could hardly believe it. “What does that mean, Brax?”

  “It means, make love, not war.”

  “I think that’s a sixties slogan.”

  “Smoking too much of the happy weed or not, they did know a good axiom when they heard one.”

  “You might have a point.” Wriggling until she could lean an elbow on the sofa arm, she put space between them. She wanted him to throw his arms around her and hug her till she popped. She wanted to give him everything she’d been holding back for three years. All her exuberance. “I know another good axiom.”

  He slid down, resting his head against the couch to watch her through hooded eyes. “And what’s that?”

  She trailed a finger from his throat to his belt, then laid her hand on his buckle. “One good turn deserves another.”

  His gaze turned hot, a fire sparking beneath those seemingly lazy lids. “What did you have in mind?”

  She drew a hand down the bulge in his pants, then cupped his erection. She felt bold and free, like one of her characters. “What base are we on if I touch you here?”

  He covered her hand, pressing harder. His gaze captured hers in an endless moment.

  Then he whispered, “We’re halfway home.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  He wanted her mouth on him. He wanted to fill her with himself. More, he needed to experience again the moment when she flew apart with his touch, cried out his name, and for one infinitesimal flash of time, drove the ache from his vital organs.

  She’d admitted feeling selfish because she’d wanted to forget for a while. She couldn’t imagine how much more he had to forget.

  Halfway home. He wanted to be home. All the way home, deep inside her.

  “I think if you so much as touch my bare flesh, I’m a goner.”

  A shadow flitted through her eyes.

  “I want to come in you, with you. It’s not a bad thing.”

  She dropped her head, stroked him through his jeans with her cheek. He knew how she’d felt when he played with her panties.

  He pulled her up by her arms, guiding her to straddle him. Her skirt at her waist made it easier, and the enticing aroma of hot, wet woman threatened to fog his brain and cloud his judgment.

  She tugged down her skirt modestly, hiding the very part of her he wanted most.

  “I didn’t bring a condom,” he said, running his hands up and down her arms. “Are you okay with that?”

  She shrugged, her hair falling forward. “Yeah. The pill. You know.”

  Being on the pill, probably another unladylike habit. Her mother jumped even higher on his shit list.

  “It’s been a while for me,” he said. “Long enough to know I’m clean. And you don’t have to be ashamed of anything.”

  She stared at the center of his chest. “The only men I’ve been with since I came to Goldstone were in my dreams. It’s sort of pathetic to have stayed on the pill.”

  He pushed her hair back behind both ears. “Hopeful. Not pathetic. And my good fortune. Do you know how much I want you?”

  She shook her head.

  “I want you more than I wanted Mary Alice Turner in the backseat of my dad’s old car when I was sixteen.”

  He hadn’t given her a name when she’d first introduced him to the theory of anticipation, but he knew she understood exactly what he meant. When she closed her eyes and leaned into him, her nipples brushing hi
s chest, he also knew he’d given her what she needed.

  “More than Mary Alice when you were sixteen?” Barely a whisper on her exhale.

  “Yeah. Way more.”

  Sliding her skirt up and tilting his hips, he pressed her down and rocked against her center until his cock screamed, until she moaned softly. “We’re gonna have an accident here if you don’t undo my belt buckle pronto.”

  “Yes, Sheriff.”

  Nimble fingers made fast work of both belt and zipper. She rose up on her knees, giving him a gorgeous view of naked womanhood, while he pushed down on the jeans until his erection slid free.

  “Oh, it’s beautiful. May I touch it, Sheriff?”

  He laughed, then groaned as she took him in hand. Closing his eyes, he savored her cool grip. “Jesus.”

  She was so close, her hair cascaded over his face as she slid her hand down, then up. “Does that feel good?”

  “Better than ice cream on a hot day.”

  “Is that a not so subtle plea for me to lick your cone?”

  He curled his fist around hers. “Hell, no. I’d never survive that.”

  “Never say never.”

  Hot and playful, she made him want to laugh and come all at the same time. Just as he wanted her to smile over her tears.

  He pried her fingers loose. “You’ve got about two seconds before I—”

  He almost lost it as she slid down on his cock hard and fast, taking him all the way inside her sweet, lush body, then settled in for the long haul. Or what he hoped was a long haul.

  “Is this what you wanted, Sheriff?”

  She stole his breath. He couldn’t answer, could only hold on to her as his hips surged, driving higher and deeper inside her.

  Her fingers dug into his arms as she tipped her head back. “Oh my God, that feels so good.”

  She couldn’t know how damn good. Or maybe she did. Looking down at him once more, she grabbed the bottom of her T-shirt and pulled it over her head, shaking her gorgeous hair loose. Her nipples peaked tantalizingly through the lace bra. Grabbing her by the waist, he pulled her close to take the sweet tip in his mouth. She arched, strained, cupping the back of his head as he sucked her through the lace.