Total pages in book: 33
Estimated words: 31279 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 156(@200wpm)___ 125(@250wpm)___ 104(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 31279 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 156(@200wpm)___ 125(@250wpm)___ 104(@300wpm)
“Um, that was the plan,” she says, and her smile wobbles. “But plans change. I might stay if… if there’s a reason to.”
If there’s a reason to.
My pulse does something reckless.
“So, um, is this the equipment you were using the night of the storm?” Aril asks, drifting toward the pile of gear someone (Ricky) dumped against the wall. She moves cautiously but elegantly, as if each step is a new experience. Like her body is learning gravity.
“Yeah.” I join her, grateful for the pivot. “Sample bottles for pollution testing. Bottom-scraper for trash. We drop more than we realize, and it all ends up in the lake. And”—I pick up the prototype clipped to its harness—“the new locator. Think EPIRB, but with real-time vitals to our servers.” I grimace. “It didn’t work.”
She turns the device in her hands, fingers deft on the casing. “This wire isn’t connected to this little board,” she says matter-of-factly, pointing to the cellular antenna that—oh. That would do it.
I tip my head back and groan. “That would, in fact, prevent it from talking to anything. I’ll have the team fix it.” I hesitate, then take the leap. “It was you, right? In the water? Pulling me back to the boat?” My eyes narrow. “And the kiss?”
Her smile is small and devastating. “You didn’t dream it.”
“Good,” I say too fast. “Because I’m about to kiss you again. Without the concussion this time.”
Her blush intensifies. “I-I’d like that.”
I step closer, slow enough to be stopped, close enough to feel the cool air stirring off her skin. I cup her jaw, thumb grazing the soft heat of her cheek. She smells like clean linen and the ocean.
Before I can consider the ramifications, I lower my mouth to hers.
It’s a mistake. I know it immediately. Not because it feels wrong, but because it feels so fucking right. Her lips are as warm, soft, and plump as I remember. I plan to pull back after that initial taste, but she makes a little mewling moan that sounds like desperation and twines her arms around my neck like vines climbing a stone wall.
Only I’m not a stone wall. I’m flesh and bone and want.
With a groan, I circle one arm around her waist, pulling her closer as I lick the seam of her mouth, enticing her to open for me. She tastes like salt and sweetness and the electricity in the air before a storm. The kiss tilts and deepens. Heat spills between us like sunlight through water.
I’m no saint, but it’s been a long fucking time since I’ve been intimate with a woman. Between work commitments and honoring the ruse between Kara and me, I’ve relied on my right hand to take care of any sexual needs.
But this woman, this mysterious, intoxicating woman, sets my body and soul on fire in a way I’ve never experienced before. And no kiss has ever felt like this. Like… more.
Innocence marks her response as she greets my eager tongue with a tentative lick of hers. I’m pretty fucking sure it’s not because she’s wary of me but because this is her first kiss. The thought sends a primal surge of emotion through my chest and a bolt of lust to my groin. Christ, why has no one kissed her before? Why has no one claimed this glorious mouth and tasted its honeyed depths?
I inhale her fragrance, something elemental heated with passion, absorbing her soft curves against my hardness and memorizing every dip and swell as they press against my chest, my stomach, my cock.
Pulling back a little, stroking a finger over her hot cheek. “There’s more, isn’t there? You looked… wrecked at the hospital. Scared. Did someone hurt you? Is that why you left?”
Her gaze flicks past my shoulder to the window, like the right words are moving out there in the air. “Not in the way you think,” she says softly.
I ease back enough to read her face. “Then why?”
Her throat works on a swallow. “I just… didn’t belong anymore.” She says it carefully, like stepping barefoot over glass. “Where I was, there were rules about what your life is supposed to be. Who you talk to. What you’re allowed to learn. I wanted to study the water for real, not just sit in a room and repeat what someone else said about it.” Her fingers twist together, then still when I cover them with mine. “I wanted to see how people actually live with the world instead of pretending they’re separate from it. And that wasn’t… welcome.”
I feel that like a hit to the ribs. “So they pushed you out.”
Her mouth tips, sad and defiant at once. “Sometimes, the place you love decides you’re not part of it anymore. Sometimes you’re the problem for wanting more.”
I let that sit between us. There are shadows behind it, too many edges, but she’s watching me with that wary, luminous look, and I know if I press she’ll vanish behind her walls.