“If you did, you’d probably see her crying.”
Jamie fell oddly silent.
Crossing her arms in front of her chest, she went to stand in front of him. Wistfully she studied his mouth, those gorgeous pale green eyes and that lean face. “You know, I really wish I was the kind who could do this.” Taking a steadying breath, she shook her head. “But I can’t. You’d tear me to shreds without even realizing it.”
With that, before he could so much as absorb what she had said, she moved around him and joined the adoring group of kids just outside the doorway.
Andi hadn’t been kidding when she had told him she wished she was the type for a quick, hot affair with a drop-dead-gorgeous, certified babe. She wished she was the kind who could spend the night rolling on the sheets with him then get up and walk away as if she was unaffected.
But she would be affected.
Already, she was affected. Just knowing he was in the same room as she was had her hands trembling and had made her belly quiver.
♥
Lying in her bed that night, Andi’s eyes were closed as a soft moan slipped past her lips. In her dream, he was there in the bed with her, stripping her clothes away, whispering to her.
“Such a pretty thing,” he murmured. He nipped at her neck before running those beautiful hands over her, suckling at her breasts, and then he lay between her thighs, burying his face there and licking at her clit, piercing her folds with his tongue, his fingers, until she was rocking against him, and begging, with her hands buried in his hair and her belly tight and hot and hungry for more.
With a rough laugh, he moved up her body, guiding her legs around his waist as he covered her body with his.
Sweat glistened on her face as she rolled onto her back, one hand reaching out, seeking, and encountering the cool empty space next to her.
In her dream, he caught her hands, drew them over her head while he worked his magic on her, nipping at her flesh, his hands hot and hard and hungry as he worked his way down her body with his mouth. Settling between her thighs, wedging her legs apart with those wide shoulders, he spread her folds with his fingers and licked at her and suckled on her clit. She was unaware of her own fingers on her erect clit as she stroked herself to orgasm while she dreamed—in her dream it was Jamie, and it was he who was kissing his way up her torso now.
And in her dream, he buried himself inside her quaking body, working his cock inside her hungrily, moving over her, releasing her hands so that she could stroke them over those gleaming, sleek muscles. His head dipped, catching the crest of one hardened nipple in his mouth, nipping at it, swirling his tongue over it as he lifted her hips and moved higher on her body, stroking against her clit as he thrust inside her.
As she pumped her fingers in and out of her wet pussy, Andi, in her dream, lifted her mouth to his, opened it and hungrily sought out his tongue, shuddering as he rode her harder, deeper, sending a flood of heat through her, tearing a sharp cry from her lips before her tense muscles relaxed.
♥
Jamie woke up from a dead sleep, his body covered with sweat, hard and aching. A groan rumbled up from his throat as he remembered, vividly, what he had been dreaming about.
Soft, hungry moans, his cock buried deep inside a tight, silken sheath that had hugged him like a greedy fist. Vanilla, woman, sex, the scent had filled his head, and her hair had been fisted around his hand.
He had tasted her, and buried his cock inside her sweet, tight pussy, riding her body as she climaxed around him. He had jerked awake just as she started to cry out his name.
Kicking the sheets away, he flipped onto his back, one hand clenched in the fitted sheet beneath him as he gritted his teeth. His rigid cock throbbed in the cool air and his hands felt empty.
Damnation, he hadn’t been like this since high school.
Then it had been pretty, long-legged Denise Hays, and the need had faded a few months after they’d groped each other in the backseat of his car, a few months after they’d lost their virginity together in the little guesthouse at the back of his parents’ property.
Jamie was dead certain he could spend the next few years in Andi’s bed and still wake up aching for her.
Clear, glistening drops leaked from the tip of his erection and Jamie gathered them, smearing them around. With a shudder, he closed his fist over his cock, sliding it slowly up and down. Closing his eyes, he brought the dream back to the forefront of his mind, the feel of her tight, hungry body, the sound of her gasping cries as he fucked her as he started to pump his cock with slow firm strokes.
“I’m gonna feel what it’s like to be inside you, baby,” he murmured, arching his back, moving into his own touch and groaning. Cupping his sac with the other hand, he pumped faster, picturing himself rolling onto his back, with her astride him now, climbing off and moving between his thighs, licking her rosebud mouth before she knelt over him and licked him slowly and thoroughly, sliding the crown of his cock as far back into her throat as she could.
“That’s it, baby,” he muttered, refusing to think that she wasn’t there. Rocking his hips into his hand, Jamie groaned raggedly as the climax started to build, tightening his sac, tingling at the base of his spine. “All the way…oh, damn…”
The first jet of come lubricated him more and he pumped harder, as the milky seed spurted onto his belly, soaking his hand, pooling on his abs as he slowed his strokes and coaxed the last drops out.
With a ragged sigh, he rested his hand on his belly, and lay staring at the ceiling.
“Damn it, I want you, Andi,” he murmured as his come started to cool and dry.
After a few minutes, he kicked his legs over the edge of the bed and went into the bathroom to shower. After tugging on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt, he stared out into the night, wondering if he’d ever get the chance to twist naked on the sheets with her. Half of him hoped not, because Jamie knew she wasn’t a woman to take lightly.
The other half of him was counting down the seconds until he saw her again.
Chapter Four
“Any luck?”
“Nope,” Jamie said, draining his beer and crushing the can before looking over at Mick. He tried not to let the relief he felt show.
He failed.
“Don’t look so relieved about it,” Mick growled. “Letcher came at me again. We’ve got a chance coming up, once he thinks the heat is off for certain.”
Tossing the beer can to the recycle box in the corner, Jamie shook his head and said, “Ya know, I can’t exactly force her to let me get close enough to her to make it look like I’m digging. But I accidentally left a PI report in my unlocked file cabinet. He was waiting in my office for me after lunch.”
“We gotta do better than that. Letcher’s not a fool.”
“Only a fool steals that kind of money and expects to get away with it,” Jamie disagreed. “There is no perfect crime. You taught me that, remember? But I’m not giving up.” Much as I want to.
What Jamie really wanted to do was just disappear until this case was solved and then magically reappear afterward, when he could devote his time to getting close to Andi Morrow. Because he wanted to. Not because the job demanded it.
He murmured a distracted good-bye to his friend as he studied the forms and figures and facts popping up on his computer.
When the telephone rang, he lifted the receiver to his ear, hearing the low, familiar voice of his mother. In the background, he heard screaming, squealing kids. “Babysitting again?” he asked. “Are they paying you this time?”
“Baby, I pay them to go out, just to let me have time with the kids,” his mom said laughing.
As he chitchatted with her, he kept remembering what Andi had said. “Mom, am I shallow?”
“Absolutely.” Her swift answer was followed by a chuckle. “Why do you ask?”
“Do I judge only by appearances and pedigrees?”
The humor had slipped from her voi
ce, replaced by outrage. “I raised my children to know better than that, to look beneath the surface. Who in the world cares about a pedigree, anyway? I don’t have one.”
No. No, that was a fact. Joanna McAdams hadn’t been born with a pedigree. But that hadn’t stopped a man who had been born with one from wanting her. Angus McAdams could trace his roots back before the days of William Wallace, and was proud of it. Angus’ genteel mother—descended from English aristocracy—had been rather appalled when he had introduced them to Joanna Marcus, a loud, brash girl from Somerset, Kentucky.
Kentucky was only acceptable if you came from the bluebloods of racing, as far as Elizabeth McAdams was concerned. Of course, the grandkids had brought her around. Babies had a way of doing that.
He wondered what his blustering grandmother would think of Andi.
He already knew his mother would adore her.
“What’s this about, Jamie?” she asked.
Rubbing his eyes, Jamie jerked his mind away from Andi and said, “Nothing, Mom. I’m just thinking out loud.”
♥
Andi juggled the bags of coloring books and toys as she jogged down the stairs. A glance at the clock on the wall told her she was early, way early. Maybe she’d miss him this time. She’d tried showing up right on time; he only waited her out, waited until the daycare settled into its regular routine for the day before approaching.
She’d even shown up late.
He had shown up in her office at naptime.
Maybe if she was really early, and barricaded herself in her office, she could avoid him.
And, again, for the third time this week, Jamie was hanging out by the locked door of the daycare. Briefcase at his feet, one leg drawn up, his foot braced against the wall, one hand tucked into the pocket of his tailored slacks, the other curled loosely around a cup of steaming coffee.
Andi was tempted to duck into the women’s restroom. Loaded down with new supplies for the kids would make it kind of awkward, but she figured she could dodge in there before Jamie saw her.
How much longer would he keep bothering her?
How much longer could she pretend he didn’t exist?
Too late, she thought with disgust. His pale-green eyes, usually so cool, landed on her and warmed, a smile curving that sexy mouth.
Palms damp, she nodded at him as he headed down the hall to meet her. Reluctantly, she relinquished the heavy plastic bags of toys, coloring books and movies to his hands. The sooner she got to work, the sooner she could get rid of him.
“Lunch?”
Her sigh was automatic, and not as irritated as it had been just last week. Sliding him a sidelong glance, Andi asked, “If I say no, are you going to keep pestering me?”
“Absolutely,” he said with a smile, following her into the daycare and settling the load on a table close to the door. “Besides, if you keep skipping meals, those baggy clothes you wear are gonna slide right off of you.”
She flushed and added a trip to the uniform store to her list of things to do this weekend. Her tunic was sliding off her shoulder and with a grimace, she tugged it back up, thankful she had worn a chemise styled tank top under it.
Between Jamie and Leslie’s comments on her clothes, she’d decided it was time to burn the size twelves. If she kept dodging meals, size tens weren’t going to stay on her long, either.
It wasn’t fair. She had tried like crazy to lose this weight in high school. And now that the last thing she wanted was to look remotely attractive—liar—she had lost almost ten pounds since he had shown up. Her appetite had faded away, she was as nervous as a cat, and she rarely slept.
Sliding him a narrow look, she asked, “And if I say yes, this once, will you leave me the hell alone?”
“Possibly,” Jamie lied as she made her way into her office. He didn’t think she’d want to hear that leaving her alone was something he couldn’t do. Not now. Maybe never.
“Possibly?” she repeated, tugging a brightly colored scrub coat from the hook on the wall, covering up the utilitarian white scrubs she wore. “How possibly is possibly?”
Advancing on her, he caught her chin in his hand, and studied her peaches and cream complexion, her rosy Cupid’s bow mouth, and her wide-set hazel eyes, currently narrowed with forced irritation. She’d finally given up wearing the glasses that she didn’t need, Jamie noticed.
“Not very likely,” he admitted. Lowering his head, he sniffed her hair, nuzzled her neck. “You see, I’ve developed this problem—I can’t seem to stop thinking about you. No matter how hard you try to convince me otherwise. This mouth of yours is driving me crazy. You just might deck me if you knew what I wanted to see this mouth doing.”
She swallowed the whimper before it could leave her throat. But she wasn’t so lucky with the moan that followed as he skimmed the side of her neck with his mouth. “I don’t like it much myself. It’s inconvenient to have you in my head all the time,” he murmured, dropping his hands to her waist and sliding them beneath the hem of her shirt, resting them on the soft, smooth skin beneath.
Rubbing his thumbs in small circles, he raised his head and stared into her befuddled hazel eyes. “You have absolutely no idea how much I want to stop thinking about you,” he said with a scowl, his eyes dark and serious. Then his lids drooped as he focused on her mouth. “And no idea how much I want you.”
The hell with it, she thought suddenly. This man wanted her. He wasn’t married, wasn’t otherwise entangled. So what if he left when his job was done? At least she would have had a little while with him. She was so tired of being alone. So tired of pushing him away when all she could think about was how right it felt to be near him, to let him touch her like this.
The heat emanating from his body threatened to scald her. His eyes were hypnotic and his voice was mesmerizing. He wanted her, really seriously wanted her. And Andi just stopped caring about all the reasons why it was wrong, why being with him would be so wrong. She couldn’t keep turning her back on him, not if he kept making it clear he was going to still be there every time she turned back around.
If she was writing the scene, this was where she would slip out of his arms and close the door, lock it, and strip down to her skin right in front of him.
If he hesitated, this was when she would wrap her arms around him and tell him to touch her. Tell him to take her, to fuck her.
But Andi was a hell of a lot more bold on paper than she was in person.
Caution, something she had been forced to learn, wasn’t something she could drop overnight. Slowly, her hands flattened against his chest, avoiding the smooth leather holster she knew he wore beneath his left arm, and slid them up until she could lace her fingers behind his neck. Rising to her toes, she brushed her mouth against his, hiding a smile when she felt his heart leap against hers.
Jamie’s eyes widened slightly in shock, in delight, before he closed his eyes, lowered his head and caught her mouth, preventing her retreat. Nibbling gently, he caught her gasp in his mouth and sucked on her lower lip until a shudder wracked her from head to toe.
Andi sighed in pleasure and stroked her hands down his arms, moving to his waist and curling her fingers into the band of his trousers.
His hands left her back to close around her neck as he lifted her mouth to his. Hovering just a breath away from her lips, he whispered, “I’ve been dying to do this again. Andi, it’s been driving me crazy.”
The whirlwind was already threatening to suck her under, even before his mouth touched hers. His tongue dove into her mouth as he arched her head back, wrapping the length of her ponytail around his fist. Slowly, warily she kissed him back, growing bolder when he made a hungry sound deep in his chest. She slid her hands inside his jacket, felt the sturdy leather of his shoulder holster, and the cool metal of the gun as she slid her arms around his waist.
He was delicious, his taste dark and dangerous, overlaid with the coffee he had been sipping while he waited for her.
He drank from her mouth the way a thirst-starved man would drink from an oasis, like she was the only thing in his whole universe that mattered. Using his mouth and body, teasing, tasting, taunting her, he backed her up against the desk, pressing his hips against hers, rocking his cock against her belly as his long fingers cupped her head and held her still.
Their tongues tangled, he nipped her lip with sharp teeth, then soothed it gently before pulling away, his breath sawing in and out of his lungs.
When she raised her hands, Jamie ducked his head again, catching her hands in his and gently forcing them behind her back where he clasped them in one of his. She stiffened briefly and he dropped a reassuring kiss on her cheek, whispering, “Shh. I won’t hurt you.” He slid his other hand up her torso to cup her breast, tweaking the hard peak of her nipple gently before he shoved the tunic up and out of the way, lowering his head to catch the hard bud in his mouth, sucking hungrily through the satin and lace of her bra.
Andi sobbed, her head falling back.
Swirling his tongue around it, Jamie smoothed the flat of his palm down the center of her belly, under the elastic at her waistline, finding a skimpy pair of panties beneath. Through them, he could feel her, how wet she was, how hot. The hell with it. He plunged his fingers past the barrier of the panties and circled teasingly over her clit as he explored the dark delights of her sex.
Plunging one finger deep inside her sheath, Jamie swallowed her cry as he pumped it in and out, circling around the button of her clit, until she was rocking and riding his hand, her hands fisting in his hair as she sobbed weakly against his mouth.
“Come for me,” he muttered against her lips. “I want to feel it. I need to feel it.” Roughly, he started to fuck two fingers in and out and her body tensed, her eyes went glassy and opaque as she shattered in his arms, a rush of liquid flowing from her as he muffled her cries with his mouth.
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