“THIS WAS A STROKE OF GENIUS,” Shelby said, as she curled into Eli’s side, the pleasant aftermath of release still tingling through her. “And to think that only an hour ago you didn’t have a plan.”
She sensed his smile. “I’m good at improvising.”
“You’re good at everything,” she said, pressing a kiss against his chest. She snuggled deeper against him, listening to the rain pound the metal roof of the old fire tower and watching it come down in a steady sheet over the edges. Treetops loomed around them on all sides, giving the impression of their own treehouse retreat, one that was romantic and away from prying eyes. Eli had packed blankets, pillows, a basket of beer and left over chocolate chip cookies, courtesy of Sally.
A thought struck and she propped up on her elbow to look at him. “You know what just occurred to me?”
His lips twitched and he turned his head to look at her, his eyes golden and sated. “What?” he asked, a hint of suspicion in his voice.
She smiled. “Technically, this was our first date.”
A hint of pleasure warmed his gaze. “It was, wasn’t it?”
Shelby manufactured a concerned frown. “I guess that makes me easy, doesn’t it?”
Eli’s chuckle moved through her and he slung an arm over his forehead. “There’s absolutely nothing easy about you, Shelby,” he said. “You are wonderfully complicated, an eternal puzzle. It’s one of the things I love most about you.”
“Wow,” she breathed, her toes curling as happiness spread through her. “An insightful compliment and I didn’t have to wind you up to get it out of you. We’re making progress.”
“Am I going to get a reward?”
“Didn’t you just get one?”
“Not for the insightful compliment,” he said. “You just wanted me.”
She playfully pinched him. “Hey.”
“I wanted you, too,” he said. “So we’re even.” He turned to look at her, searched her gaze then slid a finger along her cheek. “Thanks for letting me read your letter,” he said. “I...I needed to hear some of what Micah told you.”
Shelby had silently handed it over last night after they’d made love for the second or third time—she’d lost count—then had quietly left him alone with it. She’d found it folded up, lying on her dresser when she’d returned to her room and they hadn’t spoken about it...until now.
She swallowed. “I’m glad that it helped.”
He looked away, staring at a place on the raw-beamed ceiling. “My dad hanged himself when I was eleven,” he said, his voice strangely toneless. “I found him, too.”
Shelby sucked in a silent breath, horror bolting through her. “Eli...”
“That thing you said, about Micah trusting me enough. I hadn’t been able to look at it like that and—” His arm tightened around her. “Thank you.”
Rather than risk answering and interrupt him, Shelby merely squeezed him back and waited, hoping he’d reveal more. There were so many questions she wanted answered, but she wouldn’t pry, not when she knew it would cause him pain.
“I still don’t know why my Dad did it,” he continued. “He didn’t leave a letter, didn’t seem to have any problems, none that I can remember, anyway. It had been a day like any other. He came in from work, ate dinner, watched the news and then helped me with my homework. I was learning fractions,” he said, his smile faint. “And then, when we were done, he said he needed to check on something in the barn and, if he wasn’t back before Andy Griffith came on, I was to come and get him.” He stopped stroking her arm. “It was so I’d be the one to find him, not my mother, and so I wouldn’t have to walk out there after dark.”
Jesus. Tears pricked the backs of her lids and her throat stung. What a horrible, horrible thing to do to a kid. How damned selfish.
“My mother broke down and never recovered,” he said with an awful chuckle. “She’s in a facility in Georgia. I’ll go and see her before I report back to base, but she’s not going to know who I am. She hasn’t since it happened.”
Her chest ached, it squeezed so hard. “I’m so sorry, Eli,” she said, knowing that the words were inadequate but unsure of what she could offer. “Where did you go after that?” she asked. “Who took care of you?”
“I was in foster care until I was eighteen. Since I didn’t have—don’t have,” he corrected, “any other family.”
Well, that explained why he never talked about his parents, explained why he spent his time on leave and holidays with the Hollands. They’d become his family. And she certainly knew how that felt, because since she’d lost Gran, they’d adopted her, as well.
They were both orphans, welcomed into the Holland fold by virtue of Micah.
“I miss him,” she said, her voice stretched thin with emotion. She turned her face into his chest. She didn’t have to explain who she was talking about. Eli knew.
He hugged her tight and she felt his hand tremble against her. “I do, too.”
A sob broke loose and she cried then. He held her, grieved with her as the rain continued to pour from the sky, almost as though weeping for their lost friend, as well.
When the last tear fell from her cheek, she tilted her chin, found his lips and kissed him with every ounce of feeling she possessed. The desperation and desire, the fear and longing...all of it. She poured her heart out and then some.
Don’t leave me, I love you, love me back.
She rained kisses over his face, peppering them along his achingly familiar jaw, the corners of his mouth, the soft skin at his temples, the slope of his brow, then crawled on top of him, relishing the feel of his big, hard body beneath hers. She straddled him, then slowly lowered herself onto him, her breath wheezing out of her lungs in a low, sibilant hiss. She claimed him with every roll of her hips, every determined rock of her body.
Mine, mine, mine...make me yours.
How was she ever going to let him leave? Shelby thought. How was she ever going to let him go?
* * *
ELI BRACKETED HER wicked hips with his hands and watched as Shelby worked herself against him. Her hair hung in a long blond curtain around her shoulders, her pouty nipples sat like puffs of pinkened whipped cream on her rounded breasts and her waist was tiny, then flared into those unbelievably fantastic hips.
She leaned back, taking him deeper, then stretched her arms over her head, let her eyes flutter shut, sank her teeth into her bottom lip—as though it was too much, the pleasure too intense to bear—and rode him hard.
Sweet merciful hell, Eli thought, gritting his teeth. She was hot and tight, and the sleek contraction of her muscles grabbed greedily at him, hanging on to him, creating the most delicious friction between their joined bodies. Her breasts shook on her chest, absorbing the force of his thrusts, and he rose up, cradled her back and pulled one delicious nipple into his mouth.
She cried out and rode him harder, the need for release chasing her further and further to that goal.
“Oh, yes. Please. Right...there. Oh, dammit. I need— I want—”
Without preamble, Eli flipped her over onto her back, spread her wider and plowed into her, hard. Desire hammered brutally through him and he passed that stark desperation onto her, plunging deeper and deeper, sating himself into her with every frantic thrust of his hips. His cock hardened further, driving him mad, as she repeatedly fisted around him. He held on to her, wrapping her close, felt her tight nipples brush against his chest with every move of their bodies.
It was amazing how good that felt.
How her soft, womanly body made him feel powerful, strong, indomitable.
But she was the strong one, Eli thought, because she’d brought him to this. With a single touch, an achingly sweet kiss against his cheek, the slide of plump breasts against him, her weeping, slickened sex along his cock and then that perfect instant, when she’d greedily welcomed him into her body.
“Come for me, Shelby,” he said, angling deep. “Let it go.”
She did. Her mouth opened in a long, keening wail, her muscles went rigid, locking around him as her back left the blanket and she quaked, shook, as the orgasm ripped through her, dragging her to that place of sublime perfection.
Seconds later, he joined her there. He pushed hard and held, every muscle in his body going weak. His vision blackened around the edges and his heart pounded so hard it was a miracle it didn’t rupture against his breastbone. He sagged against her, kissed her shoulder, levered up and looked down into her painfully dear face.
There she was, Eli thought. The exception to every rule. The woman he was hopelessly, irrevocably in love with.
It was time to talk to Carl, Eli decided. Time to man up and let the chips fall where they may.
Because all he wanted was to fall into her forever.
* * *
MAVIS PARKED HER CAR at the curb in front of Katrina’s house, opened her umbrella—rather regrettably, because she loved the rain, loved the way it felt against her skin, the sound of it, the smell of it—then calmly made the trek up the front walk to her door.
Katrina’s unsmiling face appeared when she opened it. Evidently, she’d checked the peephole and knew who was waiting on the other side.
“Mavis,” she said.
Mavis closed the umbrella and shook it, then breezed past a startled Katrina into the house. Clearly—astonishingly—Katrina must have made decent money on her back, which Mavis didn’t have an opinion on one way or the other, except in how it affected Les. The smallish living room was decorated with nice furniture and decent art work—none of it to her taste, naturally, but she recognized quality when she saw it. A laptop with a small web cam attachment sat on her coffee table. Considering that Katrina was wrapped up in a pretty robe, Mavis gathered that she’d interrupted something. She turned and lifted a brow.
“I didn’t invite you in, Mavis,” Katrina said tightly.
“And yet that didn’t stop me.” She glanced at the laptop. “Entertaining a client through the wonder of technology?” she asked.
Katrina’s eyes widened. “What?”
“Don’t play coy, dear. You’re not good at it.”
Her eyes flashed. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You’re a piss poor liar, as well, then. In your line of work, that must be a detriment.”
“My line of work? I’m a journalist. I don’t have to lie.”
Mavis laughed and shook her head. “Journalist? Really? You cover weddings and the occasional traffic accident. You’re hardly a journalist. But that wasn’t the work I was talking about.”
“I don’t have time for this, Mavis. If you’ve got a point, then get to it.”
All right, then. She would. She leveled a look at Katrina. “Les isn’t going to run the Micah Holland story,” she said, and had the pleasure of watching the younger woman’s eyes nearly bug out of her head, before they narrowed into angry, suspicious slits. “You’re going to quit your job at The Branches, effective immediately, and you’re not going to tell a single living soul that Les used to occasionally frequent the escort service you work for.”
Katrina shook her head, her eyes sparking shock and derision. “I’m not, am I? And just who the hell is going to stop me?”
Mavis lifted an unconcerned shrug. “I am,” she said.
Katrina snorted and crossed her arms over her chest. “You’re out of your mind.”
“Occasionally, yes,” she admitted. “But more significantly, I’m meaner than you, and if you attempt to ruin Les, then I’ll ruin you.”
“How? By telling everyone in this backward little burg that I’m a call girl? Go ahead,” she taunted. “I couldn’t care less.”
“Right now, maybe,” Mavis told her. “But someday you’re going to meet someone—away from this ‘backward little burg’ because no one here likes you—and you’ll convince the poor miserable sod to marry you.” Mavis strolled to a table, picked up a piece of crystal and idly inspected it. “You’ll have a big wedding, a wonderful honeymoon and then you’ll settle down, have a couple of sweet little children, join the PTA and the Junior League and do all the things that you pretend to abhor, but secretly long for. You’ll finally fit in. You’ll get comfortable, you’ll be happy—” she turned to look at her “—and that’s when I’ll tell your secret.” Mavis offered a pitying smile, watched a little of the starch leave the girl’s spine. “You see, Katrina, you’re shortsighted. Right now, you don’t have anything to lose because you don’t care about anything. You’re young and stupid. But that will change, and when it does, I’ll be waiting. And I’ll destroy you then, the same way you’re threatening to destroy Les now.” She arched a brow. “Am I making myself clear?”
“Crystal,” Katrina ground out.
Mavis beamed at her as though she were a dim student who’d just had a lightbulb moment. “Excellent. Now call Les and quit. And apologize.”
“What?”
Mavis gestured casually with her fingers. “Go on. Do it now.”
Looking as if she’d just eaten a plate of shit—which, for all intents and purposes, she had—Katrina reluctantly did as Mavis instructed.
She disconnected and glanced up, an odd expression on her face. “Why do you care so much about Les’s reputation?” she asked. “What’s he to you?”
Mavis smiled and lifted her chin. “He’s the finest man I’ve ever known, the best lover I’ve ever had and he’s the man I intend to marry.”
The image of Katrina’s gaping jaw entertained her all the way to Les’s house. He was waiting at the curb for her, umbrella in hand, when she arrived.
“How?” he asked simply once they were safely inside, his face a mask of astonished disbelief and relief.
Mavis merely shrugged. “It was simple enough,” she said. “I simply explained that she wouldn’t always have nothing to lose if her secret was revealed, and that I’d wait until I was certain that she was the happiest she’d ever been in her life, and then I’d ruin it for her.”
His lips twitching, Les cocked his head in mild astonishment and poured her a glass of scotch. “A diabolical solution,” he said, seemingly impressed. “Well played. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” She took a sip, hesitated, her bravado slipping. “There’s something else,” she said, heat billowing up beneath her skin as his gaze drifted boldly over her. He lifted her hand, bussed the back of it with his lips then turned it over and pressed a hot, open-mouthed kiss into the center of her palm.
Her knees quivered, the tops of her thighs quaked and burned.
Good Lord, this man...
As usual, his gaze clung to hers, showing her how she affected him, never letting her forget how much he wanted her. How on earth had she lived in town with this man the majority of her life and not realized that he was the only one for her?
He arched a brow in a silent question, encouraging her to go on.
She gestured to his back porch. “Do you mind if we go outside?” she asked. “I love the rain.”
His fingers threaded through hers, as though he was reluctant to let her go, Les nodded and opened the door. Rain hammered the porch rooftop, pounded the lush green grass and made his flowers droop. He obviously spent a great deal of time out here, she thought, noting the comfortable chairs and small table. Jasmine grew in an arbor on the end of the porch, perfuming the sweet air, and another stand of it covered a small gazebo farther into the yard. It was lovely, almost like a park.
“I like this,” she said. “It’s lovely.”
She felt his gaze slide over her face, settle on her mouth. “I know a thing or two about lovely.”
All right, Mavis thought. It’s now or never...and never wouldn’t do. “Les, I’d like to amend our agreement again, if it’s all right with you.”
He stilled, looked up at her, his expression guarded. “Amend it? How?”
She sighed softly. “I’ve decided that simply promising exclusivity isn’t going to be enough for me, after all. I know that I’m the one who approached you, then set the rules, and then changed them, and now I’m wanting to change them again—” she shrugged helplessly, looked up at him from beneath her lashes “—but the idea of you ever being with another woman, ever so much as looking at one the way you look at me, makes my mind turn black with rage,” she said, her voice cracking with anger just thinking about it. “I’m jealous by nature,” she admitted. “So...” More terrified than she’d ever been in her life, she left her chair and knelt before him, startling him, as she squeezed his hand. “I guess what I need to know is...will you marry me?”
Heat and happiness warred for room in his gaze, then he lifted her up, swept her into his arms and hauled her through the rain out to the jasmine gazebo. He carefully set her down, letting her slide along the length of his body, then laid her down in the sweet, wet grass, cocooned beneath the fragrant vines and slowly, deliberately pressed a reverent kiss against her lips while he thrillingly yanked the sash of her rain coat open.
She was naked beneath it.
“You haven’t answered me,” she said, resisting the urge to preen beneath that hot stare. He sat back on his haunches, unbuttoned his shirt in that slow but methodical way of his then opened the snap at his jeans and freed his manhood. It jutted proudly from between his thighs, huge and wonderful and hard for her.
He entered her in one, fierce stroke, tearing a guttural, “Yes,” from his lips. “God, yes. A thousand times yes.”