Scorch (15 page)

“Yeah, I kept waiting for him to call or show up.”

“I think he was trying to wait a suitable period,” she said wryly. “Anyway, he and Roni took some stuff that they thought the kids and Russ’s parents might want, but she had a really good idea for the console and things like this.”

She nodded at a bin.

He went across to see a sports jersey and a signed baseball in a clear box on top of the neatly stacked games and bundled joy sticks.

She picked up the baseball and turned it so he could read the signatures.

“Look. Chase Goodwin. He’s from Marietta. I wonder if Piper and Sebastian know him. Russ got this at a silent auction, loved the Marietta connection. I bet he would have moved there if he hadn’t been so dug in here with family and everything.” She turned it over. “I always wondered if they really got lost that time, or if there had been a reason they went to Marietta. Like a girl, I mean.”

The look she turned up to him wasn’t so much jealous as wistful. It made his heart lurch.

“I didn’t want to ask Piper in front of his parents.” She set the ball on top of the jersey. “But Roni said we should auction it again, along with the rest.” She nodded at the bin. “For the family fund. I’ll ask Hugh to set it up.”

“That’s a great idea,” Vin said absently, thinking he should say something reassuring about her husband’s love. All he could think was,
what a waste
. The perfectly good ball in its plexiglass case. A man’s life going into bins for the goodwill. A woman devoted to someone who was gone.

Did she really believe Russ had had an early love that hadn’t panned out? Even so, didn’t most people have a puppy love like that?

Wait. He grabbed her hand. “Where are your rings?”

“Oh, um. The wedding band was a family heirloom. I gave it to Roni for Cinda. I put my engagement ring in the safety deposit box.”

She lifted her hand out of his, kind of flustered as she moved to open the closet, like she was unnerved. He could only see a sliver of her profile, but she seemed to be blushing.

“I’ve accomplished a lot while you were away. This side is completely empty and dusted.” She nodded at the empty side of the closet that Russ had used. “I’ve been thinning my wardrobe. Look. When did I think these were a good idea?”

She opened the other side and shook out a pair of jeans that were worn to threads in big streaks down the fronts of the thighs. “I buy stupid things like this because they’re on sale, then I won’t wear them because they’re so impractical. If you don’t want your legs covered, wear shorts, right? If you spill coffee wearing these, you might as well be naked. Completely negates the purpose of wearing clothes in the first place.”

“I—What?” Naked?
Focus, meathead
. “Look, Jac. I said forget it and I meant it. Don’t pack your stuff.” He managed not to sound like a cretin this time. He was calm and resolved.

“Vin, your house will sell. They all do, eventually.”

“I know, and when it does, I’ll figure things out. It took six months to get that first offer. You can’t put your life on hold waiting for me to get another one, then wait some more while it closes.”

“I honestly don’t mind. I’m in no hurry.”

“No?” He cast a skeptical eye around the room. Glanced back at her bare hand where she clutched the waistband of the jeans. Why did that feel so significant?

“This had to happen. I felt up to it, so I did it.”
She
sounded resolved. Reconciled. She folded the jeans lengthwise.

He accepted that with a nod. “And you need to go through all these steps, I guess.” He gave his hair a muss with his fingers. “But you don’t need some bum holding you back when you’re ready for whatever comes next.”

“Since when are you a bum?”

“You know what I mean.”

“No, I don’t. How is it your fault that someone else’s financing fell through? That’s just bad luck.”

“That rubbed off on
you
.”

“Still not your fault.”

He had to give her a closed-lip smile over that one. So cute. So naïve. “Something else will go wrong. It always does.”

“Come on. Don’t think like that. You bought the house with Tori just fine without any issues, right?”

“And she kicked me out of it!”

“I call bullshit on that one.” She pointed a finger at him. “You told me yourself that you told her to stay in it because the season was starting. Don’t act like that was life kicking your can.”

“Getting divorced isn’t a kick in the ass from life?”

“Divorce is a lot of things, but it isn’t bad luck. My parents got divorced for pretty much the same reason you did. Dad hated mom working shifts and wanted more kids, but she wasn’t up for it. They didn’t like doing the same things and fought all the time about stupid stuff. Underneath it all, they were just too different to live together. That’s not bad luck. Misjudgment, maybe, but we’re all capable of fooling ourselves when it comes to love.” She set her chin, brow flinching, gaze sliding into a corner.

“Which is why I’m going to stop fooling
my
self. Nothing ever works out the way I expect it to so why bother trying.”

“Are you serious? Why be here at all, then? On earth? Alive? Why bother eating? Why bother breathing? Is that why you drop out of airplanes into a fire? To save the world for other people? Look around you. Life is short enough without giving up before your time.”

So much passion. So much willingness to risk.

He fought letting her fervor affect him, kept his face stony even when she gave him that same wounded look from yesterday. She hadn’t been battered the way he had, though. She didn’t
know
.

“
I
don’t get what I want.” He was driven to impress on her. “Shit
always
happens. You want a laundry list, I’ll give you one, but this is just the latest T-shirt on the line.”

“Yeah, well I’m trying to give you what you want.” She kept her back stiff and chin up, like a little mouse squeaking at a lion who was stepping on her tail. “You can’t say it’s bad luck if you’re refusing to accept it.”

He did it. He let her push him past good sense and let her see what was in him. He gave her the eyeful of masculine hunger that gripped him. Looked over every inch of that tight body as if he had a right to, paused on the sharp points of her nipples, entertained the idea they were hardening for him. He noted where the pulse in her neck fluttered, watched her lick her lips and leave them parted, then met her startled, nervous gaze.

“Are you?” he asked dangerously. “Offering what I want?”

It was an aggressive move, but the way she was wearing at him was a friction he couldn’t bear. She needed to know he had limits.

*

Jacqui jolted under
a rush of adrenaline. Seeing the depth of lust in Vin was intimidating.
He wanted her
.

She became very aware of her limited experience and her belly tightened. Her entire nervous system began firing, toes curling into the carpet so she could dig in and run.

If she’d learned nothing else from the last few months, however, it was that life was for the living. It was
very
short. Everyone
would
make mistakes, but dropping out and hiding in Florida had accomplished nothing. She could play it safe and merely exist, or she could take a risk, leap into the unknown, and maybe find a moment of happiness.

She set her shoulders, let go of the jeans she held, and met Vin’s hard stare. “Try me.”

*

His gut tightened
and the vague tingle at the tops of his thighs became more intent.

“You are playing with fire.” He warned. “And you are not trained.”

She came to him. She closed the few feet between them and lifted that chin even higher so she held his are-you-fucking-serious stare with an I-so-am one of her own.

He held his ground, not just because she was laughably tiny and no real threat. He hadn’t fought in years, but he knew how. Backing down meant giving in and he wasn’t about to let her get away with this. But he was a teensy bit unnerved that she was acting this bold.

Because she didn’t know what he wanted, deep down where he let it smolder under soil and ash, hidden even from himself most of the time. His soul was a bottomless pit that would never be filled. If she was offering sex to fill it, she’d better be prepared because he needed lots of it.

Or back down. Now.

She faltered briefly and his conscience pinched. Then she came further into his space with a decisive step and an invisible energy like the static before a lightning strike. It stoked the glow in his belly and made the ember in his groin burn hotter. Heat licked up to fill his expanding torso.

Her hands touched his chest, scorching, making his pecs flex with pleasure so sharp it hurt. Her weight came against him as she went on tiptoe and her hand pressed the back of his head, asking him to come down to the lips she parted in invitation.

Don’t
. Off limits. Just friends.
Vulnerable
.

But his senses were inundated by the feel of her, undeniably feminine despite the subtleness of her curves. She smelled like his shampoo again. Like him.
His
.

He slid his hands under her ass and picked her up, liking the squeeze of her legs around his waist as he lifted her. Her arms snaked around his shoulders as she mashed her mouth to his.

He staggered as the sensation of kissing her slammed into him, as though she’d thrown herself at him and knocked him off balance. The backs of his knees hit the edge of the mattress and he sat.

Not this bed
. He hitched himself off the side to slide to the floor.

She folded her knees and straddled his lap as they reached the carpet, but they kept kissing. She was trying to devour him, almost frantic in the way she pulled at his lips with her own.

“Slow down.” He ordered, breaking away to cup her head.

Her mouth was pouted, her cheeks bright with color, her eyes so bright and glassy they made his sting.

“I really want to kiss you,” she said on an anxious pant. “So bad.”

A quake went through him. A collision of honor and deprivation. She needed this as much as he did.

Nice rationalization, jack ass
.

But he couldn’t deny her.

He tilted his head and drew her closer, kissing her the way he had wanted to kiss her for—Damn, he didn’t want to admit how long ago the seeds of this fantasy had been planted. Standing in this yard watching a truck pour concrete for the foundation of this house, maybe.

He shook off the memory and embraced the now. Just once, just for a few minutes, he was going to immerse himself in the thing he’d been longing for. He was going to
have
it.

And it was heaven. Her soft lips parted generously under his. Her moan vibrated in her throat. Her tongue met and played with his. Her hands stroked his shoulders under his sleeves as he luxuriated and ravaged, tried to be gentle, but was driven to be thorough.

Once. He was only going to kiss her this once. He swore.

Except her pelvis settled deeper into his lap.

Nothing compared to the feel of a woman’s heat pressing against his aroused cock. It was a singular sensation and when it was Jacqui, and she rocked to heighten the stimulation for both of them, he couldn’t help but shudder and let out a growl of enjoyment.

Her breasts rubbed his chest and little sobbing noises came out of her as she kissed him urgently, tilting her head the other way and kissed him again while rubbing like she was going to keep at it until they spontaneously combusted.

He was gonna die if he didn’t have more of her.

“Okay.” He drew back to rasp. “Let’s burn this out.”

*