by Marnee Blake
His gaze roamed over her, and she warmed in his heat. When she expected him to reach for her, though, he pulled at his own shirt, removing it. The wide expanse of his chest stole her bravado.
Every inch of him was tanned and chiseled. Even with him seated, she could make out the defined shape of his abdominal muscles. She’d worked out with him, gone jumping off a bridge with him. Hell, she’d kissed him, her entire front pressed against him. So she’d been aware that he was cut and gorgeous. But this?
Everything about his shape appealed to her, made even more sexy because he didn’t seem at all cocky about it. He only watched her as she looked at him. She ran her fingers along his collarbone. His pulse beat quickly when she moved over his neck. Then she trailed down his sternum, to those ab muscles. When he sucked in a quick breath, she retrieved her hand.
As their gazes connected, she wondered why he wasn’t touching her, too. So she lifted his left hand and placed it over her breast. As he covered her, he reached for her other breast with his free hand, his eyes finding hers in question.
“Yes,” she sighed, and he didn’t need any other encouragement. Her eyes closed as he explored the curves of her, and she gasped. “More. Your mouth. Please.”
When his warm breath feathered over her sensitive nipple, she opened her eyes, needing to watch. The sensation of his mouth covering her coupled with the view of this gorgeous man, completely engrossed in kissing her, made her cry out. His fingers moved to dig into her hips, but he didn’t pull her closer, instead allowing her to press into his mouth on her own.
He must have figured out that she wanted to lead, because he was letting her take what she needed from him.
Antsy and overwhelmed by the desire racing through her, she got to her feet. The shorts he’d given her were big, and she’d had to roll them a few times to keep them from falling down. They didn’t need more than a quick tug to fall off her hips, leaving her entirely naked in front of him.
Hunter’s fingers dug into the comforter at the edge of the bed and he groaned. “God, Charlie. You’re perfect.”
His tone was so adoring that all of her earlier need to lead went out the window. What had she been trying to do? She wasn’t the kind of girl to take pleasure with no consequences. Her heart was always in it. If she had been trying to prove that she was strong enough to weather sleeping with Hunter unscathed, she had been fooling herself.
She loved this man. Loving him would make her different, for better or worse. And no amount of being in charge in bed was going to change that.
As she stood, watching him, reeling in the emotions racing through her, his face changed. While the lust was still there, now there was also concern. “Are you okay? Do you want to stop?”
She shook her head. But she couldn’t bring herself to move, too overwhelmed to speak.
Still holding her gaze, he stood, dropping his pants to the floor. Her gaze fell with them.
The bottom half of him was just as impressive as the top half. She ran her tongue along her bottom lip.
He groaned, and it turned into a chuckle as he held out his hand. “Wanna come in with me?” he asked, gesturing toward the bed.
She nodded. “Yes.”
As he threw the comforter aside, she expected him to wave her in. Instead, he swept her up and placed her in the center of the mattress. The quick movement made her laugh, lifting the heaviness from what they were about to do. As she continued to giggle, he slipped in beside her, gathering her against him. “This okay?”
“Absolutely.” God, all those muscles felt as good as they looked.
“What about if I run my fingers along your skin here?” He lifted up on one elbow, propping his head up so he could see her better, and pointed his other index finger to her breast.
“Yes,” she whispered.
As he traced the outline of her, she gasped, her eyes closing as she gave herself over to the deliciousness of the feelings.
He paused, his fingers at her rib cage. “Charlie?” He waited until she opened her eyes again. “Is it okay if I touch your belly, here?” Again he pointed.
“Yes.” Again the word was barely a breath. He nodded, his expression completely absorbed, and he continued his exploration.
When he finally reached the center of her, he said her name again, but it came out more of a plea than a question. Their eyes met, and she cupped his face in her hand.
“Sweetheart, can I touch you here?” he asked.
His fingers weren’t moving, and the anticipation had her squirming against him, pressing up, desperate for him to keep going. “Oh God.”
“That’s not a yes,” he said, his lip tilting up. But it did nothing to temper the emotion in his gaze.
“Please, God. Yes.”
As his fingers dropped lower, finding the place where everything in her seemed to be centered, she gasped, jerking up and toward him.
Her orgasm crashed over her, so unexpected that she cried out with it. His strokes were masterful as he helped her to draw it out. When it was over, she was left lying in his arms, breathless.
“That definitely felt like a yes,” he whispered, as he pushed the hair from her face and kissed her temple.
Then she was laughing, and she had no idea when in the course of their lovemaking it had gone from her wanting to be in charge to this, but she didn’t care. “Will you please get inside me?”
He leaned over, dug around in the nightstand, and returned with a condom. In a quick moment, he had precautions taken care of and shifted to position himself between her thighs. Then he cupped her backside in his hands and pressed inside her.
She couldn’t help what escaped her lips. It was half sigh, half moan, and all pleasure. She reached for him, needing to touch him, to hold him, too.
He pushed fully in and retreated, the friction making them both groan again. Then he leaned over her, pressed a kiss to her mouth and said, “Yes.”
As Hunter began to move, she wrapped her legs around his waist and ran her hands along his sides. Her eyes drifted closed, and she lost herself in the movement and joy of the moment with him.
She tumbled over the edge again and he followed her, crying out. When they came down, she held him against her.
Who knew what the next days or weeks were going to bring? Someone had ransacked her home and she had no idea if her past had found her there, in Oregon. But right at that moment, she was thankful for whatever path had led her to him.
Chapter Fourteen
Hunter’s stomach woke him up. As much as he liked lazing around in bed with Charlie, he was hungry and he bet she was, too. Time to feed them.
He patted her on the hip. “Up. We need food.”
She grumbled, tucking her head back under the pillow, her bare ass still out of the covers and the arch of her graceful back on full display. He ran his fingers along her spine, wondering if he’d ever get enough of touching her. When she sighed, he damn near decided to ignore his hunger pains.
But if he was starving, so was she. A glance at the clock said it was nearly noon.
Food.
He shifted out of bed, pulling the covers over her until all he could see were a few dark curls peeking out. Snagging his pajama pants from the floor where he’d left them, he made a pit stop in the bathroom before heading into the kitchen.
Five minutes later, he’d started a new pot of coffee and had some bacon sizzling. When she appeared, pulling the T-shirt she’d worn earlier over her head and climbing onto a barstool, she rubbed her eyes. “That smells delicious.”
He shrugged, grinning. “Of course it does. It’s bacon.” He pushed a mug of coffee toward her. “Cream, no sugar, right?” That’s how she’d taken the cup she’d gotten last night, at the police department. He nudged the half-and-half over, and she poured.
After a sip, she sighed. “Thanks.”
He nodded, winking at
her over the rim of his own mug. “Not that I’m complaining, but feel like explaining what made you change your mind this morning?”
As he’d filled the coffeepot, he’d wondered if he should say anything about it. After all, a gorgeous and amazing woman had pretty much jumped his bones. Why complain? But this was Charlie. She wasn’t like every other woman. She was special, and whatever was going on in her head mattered to him.
He cared about her. A few weeks ago, she’d basically told him that anything between them was a bad idea. That didn’t explain this morning’s bed gymnastics.
Color exploded on her cheeks, and she studied her coffee mug like the key to the universe was inside. He could have been right. Asking might have been a bad idea.
“I decided that I was done being afraid.”
“Of me?” He set his cup on the counter, the coffee in his empty stomach turning to battery acid. “You were afraid of me?” He’d wondered if things with Joshua had scared her, made her hesitant around men. She’d never shied away or flinched when he approached her, though, so he hadn’t been sure.
“No.” She shook her head. “I was afraid of me.”
He cocked his head, encouraging her to go on. She sighed, placing her mug in front of her and circling it between her palms. “Joshua wasn’t the first guy I’d misjudged and thought was a better person than they were. There was Kevin and then Tyler in college, followed by Eddie right out of school. Joshua was just the worst.” She grinned, but it was a sad grin. “They weren’t all the same story, and I’ll spare you the gory details, but things always fell apart. In the end I started wondering if maybe I’m just not a very good judge of character when it comes to men.”
There wasn’t anything he could say to her. He could run to her defense, insist that of course she was a good judge of character. But he was afraid it would come off like he was vouching for his own character. Considering that he’d been a mess this past year, he wasn’t even sure he could do that. So he reached over and gripped her fingers..
She squeezed back. “Anyway, I reminded myself that wasn’t who I was. I live in the moment. And, well, I wanted you.” Again that blush that did strange things to his insides.
“I see.” He did, kind of. Some of her explanation bothered him, though. What about last night had changed her mind? If seeing her place destroyed had changed her mind, he couldn’t help but worry if she’d been thinking clearly. And wondering that she’d made a rash decision about him, or that she’d come to regret what they’d done, it didn’t sit well with him.
To keep from letting her study his face, he returned to his bacon, removing it to a paper-towel-lined plate. What was nagging at him was that he wasn’t sure he cared what had driven her into his arms. He’d loved having her there.
His biggest concern was that if something had driven her there in the first place, that same thing could drive her away just as fast.
As he pushed the plate of bacon in front of her, he cracked half a dozen eggs into a bowl, scrambled them up, and threw them into the pan with some of the bacon grease. He wasn’t sure if it was a universally acknowledged fact, but eggs in bacon grease were the tastiest eggs out there.
They ate in silence, sipping coffee, and he’d like to think it was comfortable silence. But it wasn’t.
When they finished and she walked around to put her plate in the sink, he snagged her arm. As their eyes met, he tried to smile. “That was awkward.”
“Yeah, I know.” Her brow furrowed. “What happened? You’re not happy about how things went this morning?”
“Please.” He snorted. “I loved everything about this morning. What I’m worried about is tomorrow morning.”
“Tomorrow?”
“Yeah.” He reached for her, cupping her face and letting his fingers trail into her hair. “Because if you changed your mind, I’m afraid you’ll change it back. And I like having you around, Charlie Jones. A lot.”
She wrapped her arms around him, and he dropped his mouth to cover hers.
He tried to put all of his emotions, everything coursing through him, into that kiss. He wanted it to say how much he had come to care for her, that he never wanted her to leave his side. That since he found whatever pulled them together, he couldn’t imagine what it would feel like to have her missing.
But that would scare the shit out of her, he was certain.
So instead of saying all those words, he tried to allow his hands and his body to show her.
He tugged her shirt over her head, running his lips along every inch of her—her breasts, her collar, her neck, her face. Everything he could reach.
When the color was high on her face and her eyes were heavy, he swooped her up and carried her back to the still-unmade bed. Laying her down, he gave the shorts she was wearing a swift tug, and they came off her hips with ease.
Those shorts were definitely his new favorites.
Then he was touching all of her, his fingers trailing into the spaces that made her breathing hitch and her eyes drift closed.
When he crawled between her legs and dropped his mouth to the core of her, she cried out. The sound was musical, and its effect was like magic, coursing through his chest, his groin, his very soul. The taste of her sang through him, and he groaned against her, even as she writhed.
Reaching into the drawer next to his bed, he retrieved a condom and covered himself.
When he sank into her, her eyes shining up at him, he was sure he’d never felt such rightness. Though he wasn’t the praying kind, he found himself offering up thanks to whatever twist of fate had sent this wandering girl into his life.
* * * *
“It’s not him.”
Charlie sat across from the investigator at Bend Police Department, her elbows on the table in the conference room. Or maybe it was an interrogation room. She wasn’t sure what they called it, but there were a lot of empty chairs. Right now, they were the only people in the room along with all of her frustration.
The investigator—Vargas—had called her first thing this morning. Hunter had driven her to her apartment yesterday afternoon. They’d spent the day cleaning up, putting things in her place where they needed to go. They ordered pizza for dinner and watched a movie. When he’d stood to go, she’d stopped him. Call her a coward, but she hadn’t wanted to spend the night alone.
Setting the place right had gone a long way to chasing away the nerves from returning. Before she returned, she hadn’t been sure if she’d ever be able to look at her place the same again. While it used to be a safe haven, a place she was coming to see as a home, when she’d walked in, it had been as if she’d never lived there at all. Completely foreign.
But when things were righted, her pictures back on the wall, her drawers reorganized, she’d started to settle. With Hunter lying beside her last night, she’d been able to sleep.
“Are you absolutely certain?” She pressed her palm into the tabletop, rubbing her other hand through her hair. “You’re sure that Joshua Oldham has no connection to the break-in at my house or the woman who pulled a gun on me on the street? The advertisement in the mail?”
It had to be him. There was nothing else.
The investigator’s eyes were kind as he opened the file in front of him. “Here are records from his parole officer. He checks in regularly, even more than he’s supposed to.” He placed the piece of paper in front of her. “This is his course list at the seminary.”
She pulled the list of classes toward her. “I’m sorry. Seminary?”
Vargas nodded. “He enrolled right out of prison.” He smirked. “Found Jesus inside, apparently.”
“He beat three women.” She leaned back heavily in her seat. “Not all at once, but over a few days. He knew what he was doing.”
“And now he’s begging for your forgiveness.” Detective Vargas lifted the final sheet from the file, placed it in fron
t of her, and closed the folder. “Mr. Oldham wanted you to have this note.”
She covered it with her hands and pushed it back toward him. “I don’t want to read a thing he has to say.” Absolutely not. There was nothing Joshua could say to her that was going to make what he’d done all right.
“Either way, there’s no indication that he had anything to do with the events of the past month.” Vargas patted the folder. “We’re continuing our investigation, of course. But if you can think of anything that might help us, here’s my card.”
“Yes. Of course.” She studied the paperwork in front of her. “Are you absolutely certain? There’s no way he’s involved?”
“I am.” He shook his head. “He’s been living at the seminary. They can vouch for his every move. I’ve checked the phone records, but he hasn’t called hardly anyone since arriving. I’m continuing to check, to see if anyone he called or saw might have been acting for him. But there are no indications that’s the case.”
“I see.” She nodded and then stood, gathering everything but the note. “Thank you so much.”
“Miss Jones.” Vargas had continued to call her by her current name instead of her old name. She appreciated it.
“Yes?” She paused at the door.
“Your note.” He motioned to where she’d left Joshua’s presumed apology. “You can choose to read it or not, but I’m not allowed to keep it.”
She didn’t want to argue, even though part of her wanted to tell this guy that he couldn’t tell her what she wanted or didn’t want. Instead, she picked up the slip of paper and added it to her pile before walking out of the room.
As she left the police department, her foreboding was worse than it had been when she had gone in. She’d expected to hear that Joshua was behind the addict, the letter, and the apartment break-in. She’d braced herself. To find out that it wasn’t him, that whoever was responsible was still at large and anonymous? Well, turned out that was even worse.
Over the past three years, she’d made decisions because of him.
Her whole life had been about staying hidden from him.