Wrapped Up in You Read online

  “My God,” she breathed, horrified. “What did he hit you with, a baseball bat?”

  “She. And it was a car.”

  She let out a breath and let her fingertips rest on a small, but thankfully much older scar on his right shoulder.

  “Bullet,” he said.

  With a grim frown, she traveled down to another scar on his left flank, also old. She touched it and he shuddered a little.

  “Knife.”

  She met his gaze. “I thought you were a small-town sheriff.”

  “I am.”

  “I figured that meant chasing bears out of Dumpsters and driving drunks home,” she said.

  He smiled. “There’s plenty of that too.” Bending his head, he brushed his mouth along her jaw to her ear, which he nipped lightly, drawing a sigh of sheer desire from her.

  “There’s a lot more to your job than I imagined,” she said, ashamed to realize she’d not given it a lot of thought before. He’d chosen a career that meant walking into danger, where most people ran away from it. That took a certain type of man. A brave one, certainly. One who cared for others enough to risk life and limb.

  While she was thinking this, he was busy sliding his big hands from her waist to push her jeans down past her hips. “You’re just about the best present I’ve had in . . .” He shook his head. “A long time. I’m going to unwrap the rest of you now, Ivy.” He lowered his head, his lips brushing her ear. “Slowly . . .”

  She shivered. “I don’t do slowly.”

  “I’ve noticed.” When he had her jeans to her thighs, he cocked his head to take in the sight of her standing there in a black lace bralette and a matching black lace thong and let out a rough groan.

  She put her hands over his to shove her jeans the rest of the way off, but he merely twisted his wrists and took her hands in his, bringing them up to his mouth to brush a kiss over her knuckles. Then he picked her up and set her ass onto the coffee table. Dropping to his knees before her, he slowly pulled her jeans the rest of the way off before tossing them aside.

  When his hands settled on her thighs and gently urged them open, creating a space for him, she readily complied with a happy noise, because now, finally, they were going to get to the good stuff.

  “Yes,” he murmured on a rough laugh against her throat, making her realize she’d spoken out loud. “The good stuff is coming. And so will you.”

  She shivered in anticipation, making him groan. Belly-to-belly now, chest-to-chest, the inside of her thighs cradling his hips, he slid his hands up her arms, her throat, and into her hair.

  And then he finally kissed her again.

  The whole time moving so slowly she was at once quivering with anticipation and sheer frustration.

  “Patience,” he whispered against her mouth. Still amused, damn him.

  Okay, yes, so she’d not been standing in line the day patience had been handed out, but seriously. How long could he drag this on for?

  A long time, as it turned out. First, he kissed her until she was panting and writhing against him and rocking up into his hands every time they swept over her. And they did this with slow, purposeful intent, his thumbs stroking over the dainty little lace bra that wasn’t doing much to keep her breasts contained, until she honestly couldn’t remember why she’d held him off. Hell, she couldn’t remember her own name.

  Somehow she’d managed to get his jeans unbuttoned and filled her hands with what she desperately wanted inside her, and by his reaction, he felt the same.

  He had a strap of her bralette down one shoulder, a mouth on her breast, his tongue and teeth teasing her nipple, whipping her into a whole new kind of desperate frenzy, when she couldn’t take anymore. Tearing her mouth free, she fisted her hands in his hair and lifted his head.

  His eyes were two hot molten pools of dark chocolate.

  “What’s the male version of a cock tease?” she demanded. “A vagina tease? Stop being a vagina tease!”

  “What seems to be the exact problem?” he asked, his voice sex-on-a-stick.

  Was he kidding? “We’re still wearing too many damn clothes and you’re not inside me!”

  His hands slid to her ass, and thanks to the thong, she felt his warm, work roughened fingers squeeze bare cheeks as he rose, her clinging to him. She’d never been so grateful for such tightly enclosed living arrangements in her life because he had only to turn to climb onto her bed. Her back hit the mattress and when she felt him laughing, she looked up at him standing at the foot of the bed.

  “You have so many pillows, I’m not sure I’m going to fit on there with you,” he said.

  Oh yes, he would, and to prove it, she began pushing pillows off the bed to the floor in earnest, in a hurry to get him where she wanted him most. This made him only laugh harder, which he was going to pay for. When she kicked the last pillow off, she got up on her knees and slid her hands south, wrapping her fingers around him and stroking.

  He stopped laughing, nudged her flat to her back, and set a knee on the bed. With a smug smile, she bent her leg and put a foot to his chest. “Still overdressed, cowboy.”

  Taking the hint, he backed off the bed and stripped out of the rest of his clothes. When he was magnificently naked—and she did mean magnificently, the guy was a work of art—he once again put a knee on the bed. “Now who’s overdressed?”

  She began to tug her bralette off with haste. But here was the thing with bralettes . . . they didn’t have any hooks. It was an over the head deal, which was fine if you were alone getting dressed in the morning. No one had to witness the stupid, awkward maneuvers one had to go through to get the thing in place.

  Getting it off was just as ridiculous, but she did her best to mimic the easy, graceful way he’d stripped. Only she failed, because she got herself good and stuck halfway, with the bralette across her face, arms up. “Dammit. Don’t look yet.” She struggled harder for a beat and then froze when she felt his hands on her thighs, sliding northbound.

  Okay, this was still going to work. He was going to help her.

  But his hands stopped low on her hips, his thumbs hooking in the lace waistband of her thong.

  “A little help?” she asked, somehow just by his touch utterly frozen in place with her hands above her head.

  “Shh.” He began to slowly—of course—so slowly she wanted to scream, drag her panties down at the very same time that his mouth captured a bared nipple. This had her struggling anew. She felt him smile against her, but that didn’t stop her from finally freeing herself of the bra with a huff.

  Still on a mission, Kel shifted a little lower, kissing and teasing his way down her body, making himself at home between her thighs, which he held open with those broad shoulders. But his mouth wasn’t where she desperately needed it. Nope, he’d stalled at her hip, which he nipped with his teeth before soothing the spot with his tongue.

  “Kel.”

  Again she felt him smile against her as he moved south, to the top of her thigh. And then her inner thigh. And then . . . finally, and then. He found the spot, the very best spot without any instructions, guidelines, or a treasure map. Her body tightened and her toes curled. A little unnerved by her shocking, over-the-top reaction to him, she froze for a beat.

  Turning his head, he gently kissed her inner thigh. “Still with me?”

  She bit her lip, glad he couldn’t see her face from this position. “I think that you know that I’m very much with you,” she managed as lightly as she could.

  “You still want this?”

  “Again, I think that’s obvious.”

  Lifting his head, he met her gaze. She did her best to hold it. “I want to hear you say it, Ivy.”

  She drew a deep breath and gave him the utter truth. “I want you,” she whispered. “In me.”

  “This first,” he said huskily, stroking his fingers over her wet, quivering flesh. “I want you to be with me all the way.”

  “Where else would I be?” she asked, both his words and actions h