by Dani Collins
His head lowered, slanted. His mouth hovered so she could feel the magnetic buzz of ions bouncing between their lips. When he nudged, made that first contact, her mouth stung, so hot and sensitized with anticipation she gasped.
He settled his lips over hers, hot and thorough. Confident. He kissed her in a way she had never been kissed before. This man held himself back with monumental discipline, she realized, because when he went for something, he went for it, and he was a force to be reckoned with. He claimed her with irresistible precision, mouth pressing hers open so the connection went from sweet suggestion to overwhelming passion in a single heartbeat.
She opened her mouth and let him in. Kissed him back with more offering than skill, not even hesitating. Compelled. If he was screwing with her—
Whatever she had consciously been thinking sizzled into nothing. She forgot how to form thoughts. All she knew was the feel of his lips against hers, smooth and firm, pulling just enough to make her follow him, then pressing to keep her sealed inside their world.
His hand slid through her hair to cup the back of her skull. His other arm went around her, broad hand slipping beneath her loose shirt to sit against the skin of her lower back, leaving a starfish of heat imprinted there. A shudder went through her, all of her muscles checking out and giving her body over to his strength. All she could do was lift her arms and cling around his neck, plastering herself to him while they devoured each other. Tongues came into play. His. Hers. She moaned, loving the swirling textures. Reveling in their blatant consumption of each other.
He was hard. She felt him against her abdomen and pulses of reaction hit her loins, making her want to grind against him. She wanted to do it already. Now.
As she realized how caught up she was, she yanked back, gasping.
He let her put some space between them, but kept his arm around her. His cheekbones were flushed above his beard, his eyes like liquid gold.
She hadn’t minded that beard, she realized, and wanted to stroke it with her fingers. She touched instead where the soft hairs had scraped against her chin, wondering how that rough-soft abrasion would feel against her stomach. Her thighs.
Her body reacted with a rush of heat and another pulse. She was very aware of the bed right there, while his eyes were halos of light around pupils the size of the moon.
“And that,” he said, accent thick. “Is why it is my business who spends time in this room.”
She pulled all the way out of his arms and pressed the backs of her fingers against her tingling mouth. His gaze was on her nipples where they stood up like little soldiers against her shirt.
Pull it together, she ordered herself.
“You’ve given me something to think about,” she said with a wan smile, desperately needing time to process this. “But I want to get back to work now.” She wasn’t going to be able to write. Brock kissed the brains clean out of her.
“Are you online? How?” He frowned. “Power’s down.”
“There are things I can do,” she prevaricated. “Pre-writing blog posts. You were looking for Trigg,” she reminded him, glancing at the door in a hint that he should use it. “Didn’t you need him for something?”
“I needed him to not be in here,” he said dryly and adjusted his crotch, casual in his need to accommodate his impressive boner.
Shake it off, she thought, aware of a tingle between her thighs that was more of an insatiable itch. She had to work like hell not to stare at his fly. With intrigue. Longing.
“But yes.” He took a deep breath and let it hiss out. “He’s supposed to be down at the base. The portable office arrived.”
“That’s only a couple of days late,” she noted.
“Yeah, but the pad’s not finished. I better get down there myself.” He didn’t move.
Be my guest. She hid her nipples behind her crossed arms again.
He wavered, gaze fixed on her mouth for two solid heartbeats. Then he nodded and started to leave.
He paused with his hand on the latch, glancing back with another flash of hunger. “We can take this up again any time. My door’s always open.”
Locks are on order, she started to say, but he was gone.
Chapter Thirteen
Soft and springy. That’s how her hair had felt in his fist. Now he was obsessively wondering if the carpet matched the drapes while reliving the way her mouth had opened under his, soft and hot. Eager.
He was a man with more testosterone than the national average. Sex was something he enjoyed at a higher level, just like everything else in his life. Yet that kiss with Glory still had him shaking the next morning.
It had taken everything he had to walk out of her room yesterday, even though he suspected it wouldn’t have taken much to persuade her into that smallish, but rumpled bed of hers.
She didn’t trust him, though. That bothered him, mostly because it was his own damned fault. He was a perfectionist by nature, rarely making mistakes. When he did face plant, he promptly got up and didn’t do it again.
Kissing her had probably been a mistake, but that whole conversation had gone a lot further than he’d meant it to. He had. The minute he’d noticed both Trigg and Glory were MIA, and his brain put them together in her room, the top of his head had nearly come off.
Since when was he the jealous type? Since never.
But he really was going to chop his brother in the throat if he didn’t stop hitting on her.
“Glory, you coming into Haven for the picnic and fireworks with us?” Trigg said, veering across the lobby as he and Rolf headed out the front doors.
Was it the fourth already? That’s why the dining room had been so quiet. It was a long weekend for most of the workers. He really needed to get his head out of Glory’s bedroom and into the reality around him.
She didn’t even lift her eyes from the tablet she held. “I have plans.”
She pointed to something and glanced at Devon, who was nodding over her shoulder. “Something like that. Would it look good, do you think?”
“Really good,” Devon agreed. “Cost shouldn’t change either.”
“Plans with who?” Trigg demanded.
Yeah. Who?
“My other ménage boyfriends. Why? Are we supposed to be exclusive?” She lifted her gaze to spear Trigg, shot a look across to Rolf and her brow pulled, wary tension stiffening her expression.
Nope. She didn’t trust him one iota.
“Come on. It was a bit of friendly rivalry. All in good fun.” Trigg folded his arms on the reception desk. “Don’t hold a grudge. You’re better than that.”
Rolf choked, hanging back, hands in his back pockets. Like hell she was. That passive-aggressive cold shoulder could go on ’til the calipers broke. Dude. But have at it. Enjoy the chin rash from skidding across the frozen snow.
Still, he watched to see if she would soften quicker for Trigg than she had for him.
“When I was fifteen, the class jock did something really mean that was—” She brought one hand up to make half a pair of air quotes. “All in good fun. You know where he is now?”
“Where?”
“No one knows. Because I know how to hide a body.”
“That’s what I’m talking about.” Devon held up a hand and Glory high-fived it. Then Devon said, “I’ll source it next week, when we get back.”
“Sounds good. Enjoy your weekend.” She waved off Devon, leaving the lobby deserted except for the three of them. She looked at them with a hint of impatience. “Something else?”
“Okay, I get it. You’re genuinely mad,” Trigg said.
“You know, your brother is always making cracks about how dumb you are, but it turns out he’s wrong. How often does that even happen?” She threw that facetious question his way.
Rolf bit the insides of his cheeks, admiring the two-for-one insult. “Economical,” he said dryly.
“Come on,” Trigg said. “Lemme buy you dinner. Make it up to you.”
She swept a chilly lo
ok toward Rolf, almost as if she expected him to jump in with a claim. He wanted to, really wanted to, but he knew how that would go. She’d take it as him playing for the win.
Not fucking playing, he telegraphed, staring at her until she looked down.
“Dad’s buying me dinner,” she mumbled as she gathered some things from the desk. “Then we’re going to watch the fireworks. So, I have a date. Thanks anyway.”
“Rain check?”
“Dear God. You are needier than your dog, do you know that? And he licks my ankles.”
“Are you saying we can be pals again if I do that?”
“Are you going to be a jerk again?”
“That’s his job description.” He thumbed toward Rolf. “Do you see him trying to kiss and make up?”
She shot her eyes to the ceiling, where wires hung in place of the old chandelier.
Rolf folded his arms, enjoying himself as he watched her chin work, trying to find words.
“Made you laugh just thinking about it, didn’t I?” Trigg said with satisfaction, arms going out like she should come around for a hug.
She ignored him and sent Rolf a nonplussed look. “Would you two get out of here, please? I want to get a few things done before I take the rest of the day off myself.”
“Find your stick,” Rolf said to Trigg, jerking his head toward the front doors.
“Fuck you,” his brother said mildly, but blew a kiss at Glory and headed out.
Rolf hung back. “What was his name?”
She paused. “Who?”
“The jock you buried.”
She tucked her chin, frowning as she went on the defensive. “Why?”
“Asking for a friend.”
She relaxed and shook her head, but gave him a considering look. Her mouth tilted in a small smile as she turned away.
*
Glory hadn’t been this loose in the joints since the first time she had walked through the doors of Blue Spruce Lodge.
Her dad had been driving tonight so she’d had a glass of wine with dinner, then another one on the beach while catching up with Eden and Candy. Immediately after the final pop, whistle, fizz, her father had yawned and said he was ready to go home.
Glory was having fun and Eden offered her sofa. She could have stayed in town or caught a lift with Trigg. He was still on the beach, holding court with a handful of locals around the bonfire, but hangovers were the worst. She elected to be sensible and go home.
Yet, as her father disappeared down the hall to his room, she walked through the empty lobby to the shadowed bar. She found the bottle of red her father had opened the other day and emptied the last of it into a glass.
Asking for a friend, she heard Rolf say again. Was that what they were now?
She had had enough distractions today that she hadn’t dwelt on it much, but now his remark came back to her along with their kiss. The one he had kept between them, not shooting off his mouth and taking down his brother with it.
What a confusing, confounding man.
She sipped and started up to her room. The lodge was extra quiet with so many people taking off for the weekend. Only Trigg was on the first floor and then Nate with his son on the middle one. She cocked her head, but didn’t hear anything.
Nate had stayed at the lodge this evening, saying he would keep an eye on things since the noise of the fireworks scared his son. They’d been throwing sticks for Murphy into the pond when she’d left for dinner, but Trigg had had the dog on the beach.
Which meant Rolf hadn’t had any reason not to come to the beach, but she hadn’t seen him there. And yes, she had looked. Why, she couldn’t say. Because they were ‘friends?’
She looked at his door as she approached her own. A bar of light showed beneath it. He wasn’t asleep, so why had he stayed home instead of coming out with the rest of the community? Anti-social or what?
Who cared? It made no never-mind to her life.
But she stood there looking at his door. Then at the glass in her hand. Apparently, there was enough of that burgundy liquid in her bloodstream to propel her the four steps across the hall. She knocked.
Quiet footsteps padded toward her, tightening her insides so she was a bundle of nerves when he swung the door open.
He wore a fucking towel, the bastard. A sheen glowed on his skin that smelled like his soap. His wet hair was damp and messy, freshly ruffled by the towel dangling from his hand.
She made an O with her mouth and slowly exhaled, taking in the tree-like pattern of fine hairs across the thick layers of his pecs. Tight brown nipples were set at the tips of the furthest branches. The trunk converged in a dark line down his breastbone, growing thin and light where it skimmed down the middle of his rippled abs. He had an innie, then a fresh line that arrowed into the edge of the white towel loosely knotted around his hips.
He leaned his forearm on the doorjamb, right at her eye level so she saw, for the first time, a small tattoo on the underside. Numbers. Coordinates, since there was an ‘N’ and a ‘W’ along with degree signs. How intriguing.
“How much of that have you had?”
She lifted her gaze from the ink to his eyes. He wasn’t looking at her glass. His gaze held hers like a cat’s before it pounced, pupils dilating into black basketballs.
“I’m not drunk.” She was loose. Low on inhibition, but not drunk.
He took the glass and stepped back, inviting her to, “Come in,” then sipping and keeping the wine.
Her feet walked her in even as her brain was saying, Really? She couldn’t even claim curiosity because she had cleaned this room. She already knew he was a man of order, all his shirts hanging straight, the drips wiped from around his sink, and his blankets were always pulled up and straightened even though he didn’t properly make his bed.
“Have fun tonight?”
“Yes. Why didn’t you come?”
“Crowds aren’t my thing.” He shrugged. “Thought I’d catch up on some work while it was quiet. Nice that you missed me, though.”
“And here comes Mr. Smug.” She stuffed her hands in the pockets of her shorts and rocked onto the balls of her feet. What did she even see in him?
“I stayed up to watch for you.” He cocked a brow at the window. Sipped. “See whose truck you got out of when you came home.”
That. She exhaled through pursed lips. “I kept thinking that I wanted you to notice me and now I keep thinking that I ought to be more careful what I wish for.”
He nodded and set down the glass, padded toward her on bare feet. He picked up her hands and turned her palms up. “You’re going to lead, schatzi.”
“Because I’ve been drinking?” She turned her hands over in his and let them stray onto the insides of his flat wrists, intrigued by that smooth, warm skin.
“That. And I want to know what else you’ve been thinking.”
“Why?” Oh, he was so smooth and hot. Her fingers did the walking up to his elbows, forcing her to take a step closer as she opened her hands on the relaxed muscle of his biceps, fingers playing in the warm valleys made by his elbows.
“What are you thinking right now?”
She looked up at him, saying nothing because her thoughts were growing positively carnal.
The corners of his mouth dug in. “See, that is very interesting to me.”
“I’m not even—” She cut herself off from saying something self-deprecating about her sexual experience. At no point had sex lived up to her romantic expectations. Her rich fantasy life was partly to blame. That, and her lack of courage. She wasn’t a prude, but she didn’t let herself go because it meant making herself vulnerable. No thanks.
“You don’t strike me as the kind of man who takes orders,” she stated, rather than admit she didn’t know how to give them.
“See, I’m offended by that. I believe in equal opportunity. I’m not a chauvinist.”
“No, you believe you’re superior to everyone, not just women.”
“Well,” he a
greed. “Almost everyone.”
She nudged him in a playful push, as a test, certain he would hold his ground.
Sneaky bastard let her shuffle him backward toward the bed, but with his fingers curled firmly behind her bent elbows in a demand that she come with him. Push-pull, like they were dancing.
“See, I’m not even going to ask if I made your ‘almost’ list, since you’re only tricking me into thinking I’m in charge right now.”
“Carte blanche. You better believe I mean it.” He lowered to sit on the edge of his bed, drawing her to straddle his towel-covered legs.
She stood over him, his hands on her hips, hers resting on his muscled shoulders, kind of stunned to be climbing her hands into his hair while the roughness of his towel grazed her inner thighs. Heat penetrated through the terry into her skin. A throb of wet heat hit the juncture of her thighs where she was unable to close her legs.
She wondered how it would feel if he let his hands slide low, to the outsides of her thighs. If his thumbs rolled underneath the legs of her shorts.
Her fingers combed his wet hair back, forcing him to look up at her as her hands trailed down his neck, feeling the flex at the base of his neck, then lingered to explore the density of muscle and heat across his shoulders.
Just as his hands hardened on her hips, she gave him a shove.
In a delayed reaction, he slowly fell onto his back and casually stacked his hands behind his head, revealing the dark tufts of his underarms. “Help yourself, then.”
Really? She set her knees on either side of his hips, watching as she knelt over him and roamed both hands over the textures of his chest, sweeping fingertips across his tight nipples, playing her thumbs in circles, then trickling her touch down his sides, fingertips tracing the edge of the towel.
He sucked in a deep breath.
“No?”
“Yes,” he said through his teeth, expression tight.
Skeptical that she had had such a strong effect on him, she left the towel in place and took her time bringing her hands up again, learning all the dips and ropes of muscle and ridges of his ribcage. Hot, smooth, rough, smooth. So hot. The balls of his shoulders, the tendons in his neck, the stubble in his throat.