Seeing Red Read online

  “You ruined that buzz with the icy shower.” She slipped her hand in the robe pocket and came up with a condom that made him want to groan.

  “I’m leaving,” he said, feeling like a damn saint because hell if he wasn’t every bit as head over heels for her as he’d always been. But he couldn’t let her do more damage, not when she had one foot out the door.

  He couldn’t live through that again.

  A gust whipped around the outside of the cottage, and again the branches brushed the windows. Summer jerked and stared wide-eyed at the dark windows. “I wish there were shutters here.”

  “It’s just the trees—” He frowned at how pale she’d gotten. “This isn’t you, you’re not jumpy over a storm. You love storms.”

  “Yeah.” But she eyed the bare windows uneasily.

  “Red.” He put his hands on her shoulders and waited until she looked at him. “Talk to me.”

  “I’d rather…” She glided her hands up his chest, wound them around his neck, and tugged, then planted her mouth to his, making him groan. He tensed, planning on pulling away because hell if he was going to let her distract him with sex again. Hell if—

  She slid her fingers into his hair, and God, he loved that. Loved the feel of her hands on him, the way she tilted her head to gain better access to his mouth, loved the way her tongue danced slow and sinuous over his.

  A crash from the kitchen had them both jumping in surprise. Joe whipped around in time to see the back door blowing in the wind after slamming open against the wall. “I must not have kicked it shut hard enough,” he said, and moved toward it.

  Summer flattened herself back against the archway between the hallway and the living room, her heart ramming against her ribs. Just the door. Her fear was definitely irrational, even to her own murky brain, but for the moment she couldn’t think, couldn’t put it all together.

  Joe came back, gazing at her face as if he might gobble her up if given the chance, and her nipples went hard and her thighs trembled. She launched herself at him, with one goal in mind.

  Sexual oblivion, the way only he could offer it.

  His hand stroked down her back and then up again as she burrowed against his big, warm, wonderful body. She slid her arms around his waist, sighing at the solidness of him, how it felt to be pressed tight, held tight. She arched a little closer and felt his mouth on her neck, just beneath her ear.

  He unclipped his pager and gun, set them on the end table, and backed her against the archway, trapping her, kissing her neck again, making her moan. At the sound, he dragged his mouth down a little, burrowing beneath the terry cloth.

  It wasn’t enough, it still wasn’t enough. A voice deep inside told her that this, with him, might never be enough but she shoved that aside, and reached down to untie the belt on her robe.

  “You’re going to kill me,” he said huskily, eyes locked on hers.

  “Then you’ll die a happy man tonight.”

  He choked out a laugh at that. His gaze ran down her body. Her thighs trembled, and between them, she went damp as she shrugged and let the robe fall. “Touch me, Joe.”

  His jaw was tight and bunching with tension as he lifted his hands and cupped the weight of her breasts, letting his thumbs rasp over the tips like the material of her robe had, only better. They hardened further.

  With a rough sound, he once again backed her to the archway. The plaster was cool against her back and buttocks, while Joe was hot against her breasts and belly and thighs. There was something erotic about being naked while he was fully dressed. It made her feel weak and quivery, and yet so powerful at the same time, but then he sank to his knees, nudged her thighs apart and kissed her between them, and thinking became optional.

  He glided his big, knowing hands up her legs, used his thumbs to spread her open to suit him, and then bent in and put his mouth on her.

  Her head thunked back against the wood.

  “How am I doing?” he murmured.

  What? How was he doing? Couldn’t he tell?

  “Red?”

  And then she remembered. He wanted her to stay with him, no escaping, no vanishing in the moment, and suddenly she felt very, very naked. “Uh…”

  “Good?”

  “Yes,” she managed. “Good—”

  He laughed softly and did something with his tongue…and added a finger…oh god…and then he hummed a little “mmm-mmm, nice” or something equally dizzying, and then she was a panting, writhing wreck, trembling on the very edge. The bastard held her there, pulling back just enough to make her sob in frustration. She tightened the grip she had on his hair and looked down at him, vulnerable not because of her position but because she was letting him look deep into her eyes.

  You don’t see me, he’d said. But she did. God, she did. Didn’t he know that was the problem? That every time they did this, he dug himself further into her heart? “Joe,” she whispered, her throat tight, her eyes burning. “Don’t you even think about stopping.”

  He let out a slow smile, his eyes hot and hungry, and bent back to his task, and this time let her take the plunge. When her knees collapsed, she fell right into his arms on the floor. Engine still revved, she tumbled him over to his back and tore at his clothing just for the joy of having his hot, sleek, hard flesh beneath her fingers, and then her mouth. She kissed his shoulder, a pec, making her way past his rib cage, his quivering belly, swirling a little lower until he hissed out a breath. And when she got to the prize and took him into her mouth, he let out a guttural, rasping moan. His hands came up and fisted in her hair. “Red—”

  She shut him up with a single swirl of her tongue and was well on her way to driving him as insane as he’d driven her when suddenly she found herself flat on her back, his big hard body towering over hers, his eyes glittering as he reached out and picked something up off the floor.

  The condom.

  He tore the packet open with his teeth, his eyes never leaving hers as he covered himself, as he nudged her thighs open and made himself at home between them and cupped her face in his hands.

  “I love you,” he said, and began to move. He took them both right out of themselves and back again, wild and free, simple and beautiful.

  And terrifying. So damned terrifying.

  Chapter 18

  Summer lay beneath Joe, listening to him breathe. Her heart was still beating so wildly in her chest she thought maybe her ribs would crack.

  He’d said he loved her.

  She’d spent the last twelve years avoiding emotional attachments. She hadn’t put a name to it, or really even made a conscious decision to do so, but that’s exactly what she’d done. Until now. Now she faced the very dilemma she’d never wanted.

  She’d let a man into her life, and not just any man, but one that knew her better than anyone else, giving him the tools he needed to break her heart.

  How did they move on from here? Could they really pretend he hadn’t said what he had in the thick of the moment? And surely, that was all it had been.

  Though she’d been in the moment many times and had never felt the urge to let those three little words fly.

  Joe rolled with her so that she lay sprawled over the top of him. He slid a hand down her back to cup her butt. “Now you can cut off the circulation to my legs and other vital parts. Seems only fair.”

  There was a teasing light to his voice, thank God. “Complaining?”

  “Hell, no.” He added his other hand to her ass.

  From outside the wind still whistled and howled, brushing tree branches against the windows. Even with all the noise, she could still hear his heart still pumping strong and steady beneath her cheek with enough force to provide electricity to the entire town. She lifted her head and stared down into his face. “Do you need a glass of water?”

  “Sure, if you could give it to me intravenously.”

  Okay, good. Lighthearted fun, which happened to be right up her alley. She went smug. “Can’t move, huh?”

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