by Gemma Bruce
But she knew better than to compensate for him. She knew about injuries, and she knew the last thing you needed when you were on the long road to recovery was pity, or mollycoddling. Look at Betty. She never gave in to her disability, at least not that anyone saw. Everyone in the family loved her to pieces. They wouldn’t belittle her by cutting her a break because she was slow and there were things she’d never be able to do again.
She guessed that Dillon was the same way. Jogging every morning. Making himself walk, slow and even, masking the weakness in his leg. Maybe that’s why he was so skittish about having sex with her. Any halfway testosterone-driven man who saw her standing touching-distance in her underwear would have pushed her inside, and they would be having hot, get-down, toe-curling sex right now instead of hiking through the woods for a picnic.
It hadn’t stopped him last night, she thought, reliving those few minutes with a rush of pleasure. There was probably some psychological weirdness going on with him, vacillations, feelings of inadequacy. Men always got them.
Maybe he just needed some encouragement. But she’d be damned if she’d act all simpering and helpless like some ditz from a fifties movie.
She slowed down and let him catch up. Yeah. She’d been right. He wasn’t even breathing hard. He took the picnic bag from her, and she let him.
But when they came to the end of the path and Andy looked at the tree leaning diagonally against the pine, she started to have second thoughts. What if the trunk didn’t hold his weight and he fell? What if he just fell? What if he got to the top of the wall and couldn’t get down?
And what if you just give the guy a break and let him try?
“You’re okay with the log? And you have to climb down a tree on the other side.”
His jaw tightened. “I’m okay.”
“Look. I know you’ve just had surgery. And I know what it’s like to have an injury and how impatient you get, so don’t do something stupid.”
“I said I can make it.” He paused and added, “I might be a little slow, but I’ll get there.”
“Suit yourself. At least give me the picnic bag.” She reached for the strap, lifted it away from him. He held on. There was a moment of wrestling. She gave him a look. The wrestling continued in their gazes. Then finally Dillon let go.
Ariadne chuckled. “Left me holding the bag, huh?”
Dillon automatically reached for it.
She swung it out of his reach. “Sorry, sorry. It was just too good to resist. Come on.”
She ran lightly up the tree trunk, counterbalancing the weight of the bag by holding her free arm out to the side. When she reached the top of the wall, she looked back to give Dillon an encouraging look.
He was looking up at her with a slight frown on his face. Their eyes held. Then he broke contact and he stepped onto the fallen trunk. His foot slipped and a shower of dead bark drifted to the ground. Andy snatched back the hand that had automatically reached out to him.
He stepped again. This time the tree held, and he began a slow and deliberate ascent to the wall.
Andy held her breath, watching. This was a stupid idea, but it had been his idea, and she wasn’t about to try to talk him out of it. He probably wouldn’t talk to her for the rest of the session. The fragile male ego.
It seemed to take forever until he finally stepped onto the wall. There was a sheen of sweat on his forehead, but a remnant of a smile on those usually taciturn lips.
She turned away so that he wouldn’t see her pleasure in his accomplishment. It wasn’t something you could share with a stranger.
We’re not strangers, she reminded herself. We’ve slept together. Well, not exactly. They’d fucked in a shower. And pretended like it hadn’t happened ever since.
She shifted the lunch bag to her shoulder, then swung to the tree limb nearest the wall. She hung there for a moment making sure Dillon had seen where she landed, hoping he’d catch on without her having to say, use that branch, watch out for—
Hell, she didn’t know why she was making such a big deal about it. How many mid-level executives could scale a wall and climb down a tree on the other side. Most didn’t even want to. But something told her that Dillon took these kinds of activities for granted. Or had once. From the look on his face, he was determined to do them again.
She dropped to a lower branch and then to the ground. Moved aside to give Dillon space to land. He looked down. His eyes hard, determined. He tossed the blanket to her, and while she was catching it, he jumped to the branch. It groaned beneath his weight; for a sickening moment she thought it would break and he would plummet to the ground.
Okay, it was only six feet from his feet, but it still could do serious damage. His feet pedaled in the air, then found the next limb. Andy had to force herself not to go over and spot him. There wouldn’t be anything she could do if he did fall. He would knock them both down.
He let go, hovered in the air, before grabbing the lower limb and releasing his feet. He hung there for a few seconds, then let go of the branch. He landed silently, crouched on all fours.
Panther, Andy thought. He does move like a panther.
He stood up, safe and sound, if a little off balance. He brushed off his hands and, not looking at her, picked up the blanket and the bag. “Which way?”
She pointed to his right.
Dillon shifted his load and struck off through the trees.
Andy, grinning, followed him.
———
It was all uphill. Dillon was feeling the strain from his tree acrobatics, but he gritted his teeth, wiped away the sweat, and kept climbing. Ariadne sometimes walked by his side, sometimes let him lead the way, and several times had to blaze the way when the path disappeared into a stand of fallen scree. He could hear water, occasionally glimpsed a stream, but every time he asked if it was a good place to stop, she merely said, “Not yet,” and motioned him onward.
He was beginning to suspect her of trying to tire him out, when she left the path. He followed her and stopped short when he came out of the woods onto a granite boulder that curved down into a clear blue lake. At the far end, a waterfall coursed down a rock palisade.
Andy stood with her hands on her hips, gazing across the water. She looked like a goddess, dressed in sweats and camisole, her braid like a coil of rope down her back. He longed to pull off the band, loosen the plaits, and bury his face in the rich strands. He came to stand beside her.
Light reflected off the glassy surface of the water. The air was warm where the sun broke through the trees, the falls rumbled faintly in the distance, and the woman who stood beside him was making him randy as hell.
Time passed as they stood silently taking in the majesty of the place. Finally, she turned and smiled at him.
He dropped the bag and the blanket, caught her up, and wrapped her in his arms. He’d meant to play it cool, ask more questions and see if her investigative reporting was going to interfere with his own investigation. But the second he touched her, he was lost.
She was strong, firm and warm. Especially warm. And he missed that. Warmth. And more than just physical warmth. Isabelle’s body had been warm, but everything else about her was cold as stone.
Don’t think about Isabelle, lover, betrayer, the perpetrator of his attempted murder.
Ariadne slanted him a glance, a question in her eyes. He shook his head, driving out the memories. She reached up, ran her lips gently over his, releasing the tension he didn’t know he was holding.
She pulled away, smiled, then brushed his lips again. He shivered and held her tighter, while telling himself not to lose control.
She had been in his mind ever since he’d left her early that morning. Hell, ever since he’d walked past her in the doorway of her bedroom that first day, when she was wearing her hair in a bun and those ridiculous glasses. His rational mind had kept the thoughts at bay, was fighting his desire now.
Everything about her intrigued him. Her sensuality, her ability to scale walls. Her sexual enth
usiasm. But it hadn’t been just sex, at least not for him. And that scared him. Made him mistrust his instincts.
Nobody, not even Talbot, knew the depth of the spell that Isabelle had woven around him. He’d been sent in to charm her into making a mistake, and she had done the charming. And his was the mistake. It was sheer dumb luck that she was dead and he was alive.
But he had promised himself never to take that chance again. He didn’t trust himself to have sex with Ariadne, because she wove her own kind of spell. Only hers was giving and loving as well as possessing.
But no matter how hard he tried to put the various things he knew about her together, he came up with an incomplete picture. That bothered him. And he wanted her more than ever.
“Time to come back now.” Ariadne was regarding him with a patient smile.
“Sorry.” He looked around. “You want to eat here?”
“I want to swim first.” She sat down, took off her shoes.
“Do you have any idea how cold that water is?”
“Freezing.” She pulled off her socks and stuffed them in her shoes. Her feet were high arched, the toes long. Suckable.
He dragged his eyes away.
“Know how to swim?”
“Of course.” Dillon sat down and started untying his shoes.
She pulled the camisole over her head, revealing an aqua bra. His pulse jumped. She stood up and pushed the sweatpants down her legs. A tiny matching bikini bottom barely covered her butt. His dick responded instantly. And she knew it.
Her smile changed. His heart hammered against his breastbone.
She turned away and dove into the water. He jumped awkwardly to his feet and pulled off his T-shirt. He looked out into the water and could see her swimming just below the surface. Then she came up for air, tendrils of hair clinging to her cheeks. She looked back at him, and Dillon dove in after her.
He came up ten seconds later gasping for air, his lungs paralyzed from the cold. His muscles were frozen; his teeth were chattering. He would probably sink right to the bottom.
Ariadne tread water, grinning at him. She scissor-kicked; her body rose out of the water, then curved into a shallow dive, before it disappeared beneath the surface.
The woman was a maniac. Dillon paddled himself in a full circle, looking for her. He didn’t see her. This kind of temperature could cause a cramp. She might be in trouble.
Something brushed his leg. He nearly jumped out of the water, then felt two hands on his thighs. She surfaced behind him. He turned in time to have a spray of water hit him in the face.
“Hey,” he said and grabbed for her. She ducked away and was gone. He watched the ripple of water as she skimmed just below the surface. She was fast. He swam after her. Just when he thought he might catch her, she somersaulted in the water and swam beneath him in the opposite direction. She hadn’t once come up for air.
Nearly fifty feet away, she shot out of the water like a dolphin.
Dillon swam toward her, keeping his head above water, his eyes on her as his arms and legs propelled him forward. And again she slipped beneath the surface. But this time he was ready for her. As she skimmed past, he grabbed her waist, tucked his legs under her knees, and flipped her into his lap. She laughed as she rolled out of the water. The sound was throaty and delicious. She didn’t try to get away, just stretched her legs out in front of them, wiggled her toes, and proceeded to drive him wild.
He pulled her tighter until she was pressed into the bend of his thighs. Wrapped his arms around her waist while his teeth pulled at the bow at her nape.
The bikini top was sleek as skin, and it fell away to float on the water. His palms replaced the pieces, covering each breast with an urgency that even the cold couldn’t quell. He stopped kicking just to enjoy the sensation, and they started to sink.
“Blanket,” he said.
She turned in his arms, and their knees touched as they both tread water to stay afloat. “Chicken.” She released the back of her top and hoisted it into the air like a flag. He reached for it. She laughed and pushed his head under the water. When he came up sputtering, she was swimming away.
“You’ll pay for that,” he called and swam after her. But long before he caught her, she hoisted herself onto the flat boulder and sat, naked from her bikini bottoms up, her feet arched like a ballerina’s, her head thrown back to the sun. He reached up and grabbed her ankle. She squealed and he laughed out loud. It completely surprised him. How long had it been since he’d laughed?
She pulled her knees up, hiding those luscious breasts, and held out her hand. He looked at it, took it, braced one foot on the rock, and let her help him out of the water.
They sat side by side, water pooling beneath them. Ariadne shivered and he put his arm around her. She melted into him. her head settled on his shoulder, and they just sat, not needing to speak. Until he realized that his hand had somehow found her breast and was playing with its pebbled nipple.
“Blanket,” said Ariadne. She stood up and flapped it open. Two foil packets fell onto the boulder. She grinned at him, tossed the packets to him and spread the blanket across the rock. “Lunch is served.”
Dillon pulled her down to the blanket, pushed her onto her back, and began to explore.
His hand cupped her hip bone. His fingers trailed up her ribs, setting off a crop of goose bumps. She pulled him up along her body. He brushed his lips over hers, pushed back on his elbows to look at her. Her hand wrapped around the back of his neck and pulled him back. Her mouth parted, inviting him in, and he went.
Her tongue met his, then invaded his mouth. He had a hundred questions he’d meant to, needed to, ask. They flew out of his head. There was an ulterior reason for bringing her here. He forgot what it was. And nothing existed but Ariadne’s cool skin and lips under his. Cool skin that was rapidly heating.
Her hands left his neck, ran over his shoulders and down his back. Hesitated when her fingers touched his scar. Dillon froze. But her fingers kept going, tracing a line down his spine.
He rolled to the side so his weight was off her, but their sides were touching. His fingers skimmed over her shoulder, down the soft skin of her breast, over the nipple and beneath the gentle curve of her breast until he could cup the fullness of her. Gently, he chafed warmth into her skin. Then he lifted the breast, rolled her sensitive nipple between two fingers, then leaned over and nipped it between his teeth.
She wiggled beneath him, making throaty sounds of pleasure. Speared her fingers through his wet hair, kneaded his shoulders. He moved hungrily to her other breast. She feather-brushed his sides, and he twitched.
“You’re ticklish,” she breathed into his hair.
He shook his head, not giving up her nipple to answer.
“You are.” She poked him in the ribs.
His mouth broke away. “Stop it. I’m busy here.”
But she’d achieved her goal. Her hands plunged into the back of his gym shorts, her fingers splayed across his butt. His gluts tightened in response. She pulled him close until his erection was hard against her thigh.
“Polar bear,” she said.
“What?”
“The cold doesn’t affect their ability to get it up.”
He laughed. “Is that true or did you make it up?”
She rubbed against him. “I have no idea. Let’s see.” She pushed him onto his back and straddled him in one motion. Before he recovered from his surprise, she rubbed up the length of him.
Her braid slid over her shoulder and brushed his chest. He arched against her, fumbled at the elastic of her bikini bottoms, pushed his hand inside, and cupped her. She sighed, squeezed her thighs against his hand, pressing his knuckles into his own heated flesh.
She leaned forward, her hands resting on his shoulders. Her breasts fell enticingly close to his mouth but just out of reach. He wanted to touch her, take both of her breasts in his hands. Bury his face between them, but one hand was trapped by their bodies.
He eased on
e finger into the slickness of her. Felt the jolt of her moan in his balls.
“Touch your breasts,” he said between jagged breaths.
She lifted her hands, circled the buds of her nipples with her palms. Closed her fingers around the firm flesh and squeezed them until they pointed right to his mouth.
Her lips were slightly parted, her eyes glazed with desire.
He grasped her hip with one hand as he worked his finger up and down the cleft between her thighs.
The sunlight glinted off her hair. He thrust against her through their clothes, past his own hand. The movement urgent. Her hands moved down her abdomen, clasped his wrist, and she rode his arm.
Fire ignited in his groin.
She lifted away from him, just enough for him to yank down her bikinis, giving his hand more room and exposing a triangle of dark hair. He plunged a finger into her and she shivered.
“Are you cold?”
“No. I want you out of your clothes.” She eased his hand from her swimsuit, pushed back on her knees, and grabbed the waistband of his shorts.
He raised his hips. She lifted the shorts over his erection and tugged them down his thighs. Stopped long enough to close her fingers around his cock, then pulled on his shorts. The fabric was wet and it rolled up around his thighs. She laughed and started working them down his legs, until they were a tight roll at his ankles.
“I hope you won’t have to get into those in a hurry.” Her bikini bottoms slid effortlessly down her legs to the blanket.
He pulled her down then and rolled them over so that he was on top. He lifted her knees, pushed them apart, and dove between them, licking and circling and sucking until her body jerked frantically beneath his mouth.
He crawled up the length of her, patted the blanket until he found a condom. A second later he lowered his body onto hers. “Am I too heavy?”
She shook her head and wrapped her legs around his thighs.
He shifted to one elbow, grabbed her thigh, and lifted her leg until it was around his waist. He pressed against her, until just the tip of his erection was embedded inside her. Slowly, he pushed farther in, opening her with his fingers and watching her eyes. He shifted his position so he could get deeper, grazing her pelvis with each thrust.