“We’ll be discreet. Damn it, Olivia, this doesn’t have to be this hard.”
“What?” she asked. “Casual sex? I told you before I’m not interested in that.”
He stepped back and gripped a chair at the table. His muscles bulged underneath his sweater. He dropped his chin to his chest before facing her. “Okay, you seem to need to hear this, so here goes. I’ve never had anything but casual sex. Getting away from home, doing my best in school, getting ahead at work always came first. There were women, lots of them, but I couldn’t afford to get distracted. I don’t know another way to be with someone.”
“You’ve never been in a relationship? Ever?”
“No. I’m not a patient man, Olivia. Apparently, relationships are a lot more work then I’m used to.”
“So all those women I saw you with, the models and actresses, you just slept with them?”
“Most. Not all.” He shrugged. “I’d buy them dinner first.”
“How sweet of you.” She felt sorry for the women she’d envied only hours ago. Reality was a far cry from what she’d imagined. “I won’t feel pressured into something I’m not ready for just because you’ve never had to wait.”
“If it makes you feel any better, I’ve never wanted to pressure someone into more. And I’ve never shared as much about my life as I have with you.”
She stepped forward and brushed her thumb along his jaw. “I wouldn’t even consider being with you if you hadn’t been willing to share.” She tested them both by placing her hands on his face and brushing a gentle kiss on his lips. He grabbed her wrists when she tried to move away.
“Let me?” he said. He let go of her hands and placed the pads of his fingers on her cheeks and gently, erotically ran them over her face from hairline to chin. He traced her lips with his forefinger, causing a moan to escape.
“You’re stunning.” He replaced his fingers with his lips. “Absolutely perfect.”
“Jack…”
“Just a little more.” His hands surfed lower, to the straps of her dress, and lower still along her arms. He wrapped his hands around her hips and yanked her forward. She felt his erection through the thin material of her dress. He lifted his palms and rubbed his thumbs over her breasts. Damn him, he was determined to make walking away from him a herculean feat. When one hand left her breast, she thought he’d surrendered until he reached around and cupped her through her dress.
“Jack, please.”
“Please what?” He glided his hand along her thigh and snaked his fingers inside her panties. “Sweet Christ, Olivia.”
She clung to him when he eased his fingers inside and her body bucked. He wouldn’t stop the torment, in and out, in and out until she could no longer think to resist. He held her around the waist when her legs gave out and continued his torment, determined to melt her resolve. She’d have begged him if he’d stopped. In and out, in and out, he was unrelenting. When his thumb grazed her sensitive nub, she cried out.
“Let go, Olivia,” he said, his voice like gravel. “Let go.”
She cried out, bucking against his hand, heedless to anything but the sensation of him bringing her to climax. He kept up his pace until her quaking body, spent, lay pliant in his arms. He kissed her as she came back to herself, drinking every ounce of pleasure from her body.
If he’d lifted her to the table, she’d have opened for him. If he had asked, she would have dropped to the floor. If he’d grabbed her hand and yanked her down the hallway to his bedroom, she’d have run ahead of him and tackled him on the bed. He did nothing but kiss her gently, easing her back to sanity.
“Go home, Olivia, before I won’t let you.”
“Jack, that was…I…”
“I want you. I know you want me, too. If you need to wait, I’ll wait. But you remember what it felt like to come in my arms and know that was only a taste of what I plan to do to your incredible body. And there won’t be anything casual about it.”
He held her at arm’s length until she could stand on her own. He reached behind her and grabbed her purse from the counter, tucking it under her arm. “Go home and think about me touching you because I’ll be thinking about touching you until I see you again.”
Olivia swallowed and nodded, walking like a robot to the door. “Thank you for…everything.”
“It was my pleasure.” He brushed his lips against hers and opened the door. “Until tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow?” she choked.
“You’re teaching Erica. I’ll see you then.”
***
Lyle lifted his hand and gently ran the back of his knuckles down Erica’s cheek. Erica sucked in a breath as her eyes grew dark. “Lyle?”
“Erica?” He’d never known a woman so full of contradictions, and every one of them was written on her face as he inched forward, as his fingers wedged into all that long, dark hair, as her lips tilted up toward his and parted.
“What are you doing?” she asked, her eyes huge.
“I think you know.” He slipped his other hand into her hair, holding her captive as anticipation mingled along with their breath. “I think you want this as much as I do.”
“I don’t want anything from you,” she said, her voice a raspy whisper.
“I guess we’ll see.” He dropped his head with his eyes still glued on hers, unsure really as to what she might do if he closed them. Her eyelashes fluttered as he brushed his lips against hers once and then twice. They fell with a whimper when she kissed him back, their tongues colliding. Kissing her was like discovering an untapped well, an explosion beyond his wildest imagination.
He felt her hands on his hips, her nails digging into the skin of his back, and gloried in the sensation. For all the weeks he’d wondered if she’d felt anything for him close to what he felt for her, her hands clinging to him told him all he needed to know. What was more satisfying than her surrender was the discovery of the passion just beneath Erica’s thin, fragile surface.
She bowed back, making him groan as heat met heat. Her hands crawled up his shirt and tangled in his hair. He wasn’t sure if she was surrendering to passion or fighting it to the death, but at the moment, he didn’t care. All he knew was he’d only scratched the surface and he wanted, needed more.
With her back to the wall, he let his hands glide lower, over the full heaviness of her breasts. He felt her aching nipples strain against her thin top and felt her breath catch as he caressed the tender tips with his thumbs. They rocked into one another in a rhythm as old as man. He couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move as her name pounded in his head and her scent, that wild and earthy fragrance, permeated his skin.
When he cupped her backside and lifted her off the ground, stepping inside her parted legs, he molded her to the wall and ran his lips down her neck. She took one gulp of air before her body stilled, as if breaking the seal of their lips had broken the spell. She gripped his shoulders and said his name, not with passion or pleading, but with deadly seriousness.
“Lyle. Let me down.”
He jerked his head up, still breathing hard. When he saw the look in her eyes, he eased her down the wall but didn’t step back. “What’s wrong?”
“I need some air.” She pushed on his chest and he stepped back. She ran past him out the door.
“Erica, wait!” he shouted from the threshold, but she was gone. She ran out into the darkness. He heard her gasp as she slipped down the steep embankment. He caught up with her as she took her first steps into the river. He grabbed her hand. “You shouldn’t cross alone.”
She let him guide her to the other side, holding tight to his hand until she stood safely on the opposite shore. “Thank you. I can make it back from here.”
“Erica, please…”
She yanked her hand from his. “I have to go.”
She ran down the path toward her house. After a moment’s hesitation, Lyle followed. He wouldn’t be able to live with himself if something happened to her between the river and her house. He stood at the edge of the path where the trees opened up to her property and shielded his eyes as the headlights from Olivia’s car flashed as she pulled out. He looked up in time to see Erica run through the door.
Great, he thought. Just great. What had happened and how in the hell was he supposed to stay away from her now?
Chapter 28
Tyler pulled into the raft and fly shop and smiled when he saw his dad’s car still in the lot. He was later than he thought he’d be coming from his last class. One of his students had wanted to talk about the economic crisis of 2008 and Ty was all too willing to oblige. He hopped out of his truck still wearing his khakis and button-down.
“A little over dressed for the fly shop,” Jesse commented without even looking up from the counter where he tied a series of intricate flies.
“Sorry I’m late,” Ty said. “One of my students is a little eager.”
“The female kind?”
Ty chuckled. “No, the economic major kind. The female kind wears too much perfume and doesn’t button her tops. That,” he said, pointing, “doesn’t leave this room. Jill would kill me if she thought I was being hit on every day.”
“Are you?”
“Not every day. So,” he picked up the fly, “this is good work.”
“Figured I’d give it a try since you were late.” He strung the last feather. “So what? Every other day?”
“Drop it, Dad.”
“Fine, fine. If you don’t want to tell me about your exploits with women before the big day, whatever.”
“You really think I’d have a last fling?” Ty asked. “Did you?”
“Hell, no, I didn’t have one. Have you met my wife?”
“Indeed I have. Have you met mine?”
“You mean your fiancée?” Jesse asked. “She’s not your wife yet.”
Ty hated lying to his family. The fact that they still hadn’t figured it out meant he was a better liar than he thought. “Will be soon enough.” In God’s eyes, at least. Getting married in a church meant something to both he and Jill. That’s what he kept telling himself when the guilt got too much.
“How’s the wedding planning? Lord, I don’t envy you that mess.”
“Jill’s handling it. I just nod most of the time. Her mom’s getting on her nerves, but otherwise, I think it’s been pretty painless.”
“And she likes it here?”
Ty lifted his head from the fly he’d begun to tie. “Yeah. Why? You heard otherwise?”
“Calm down. Jeez, you’re so whipped, it’s embarrassing.” Jesse lifted his ball cap, scratched his temple, and replaced the cap backward. “Your mom said she’s happy with her work at the restaurant. I think they’re getting along great.”
“Jill likes mom a lot. She likes Lita, too, so don’t worry.”
“I’m not worried. Every time we see her, Angelita squeezes my arm and says, ‘Awe, Jesse, I just love her.’” Jesse stood up and stretched his back. “You two okay living up there with Cal?”
“So far. I think granddad likes having us around.”
“We like you being up there with him, but I don’t want you and Jill to feel like you can’t leave and get your own place. Whenever you’re ready, you just say the word.”
Ty hadn’t thought about moving. He liked that his granddad was around most of the time so Jill was never completely alone. “I don’t think we’ll need more space for a while.”
“Until the kids come along,” Jesse said and wiggled his eyebrows.
“Don’t start already. I promised Jill you and mom wouldn’t pester us about grandkids because yours were so young. Don’t prove me wrong.”
“I’m just kidding. You take all the time you need to be together before you bring a baby into the world. They’re blessings and miracles, all of them, but take some time for just the two of you. Everything with you and Jill has happened so fast.”
“Are you worried about us, Dad? Is that what this is about?”
Jesse looked up from his fly and placed a hand over Ty’s arm. “I’m not the least bit worried. I’ve seen the way you and Jill look at one another. I just don’t want you to rush to the next step too soon.”
“We’re not. I promise.”
On the way home that night, Jesse’s words echoed in Ty’s head. He and Jill hadn’t really set a timeline for having kids. He didn’t think she was in any kind of hurry, but he wouldn’t know for sure unless he asked her.
She met him at the door. It always gave him a thrill to see her at the end of the day, but she usually looked a little happier to see him. “Hey,” he said. “I didn’t expect you home so soon.”
She wrung her hands and stepped back to let him in. “Don’t be mad.”
“About what?” he asked.
“I didn’t mean to, Ty. They ambushed me, and I didn’t have a choice. They thought I was having doubts about the wedding.”
He laid his hands on her shoulders. “Slow down. Who ambushed you?”
“Olivia and Lyle.”
“Olivia and Lyle thought you were having doubts about getting married?”
“Yes, so I had to tell them.”
“Tell them wha—oh, no. You told them about the wedding.
Our
wedding.”
“I had to. They could tell I was lying, and the more I talked, the bigger hole I dug.”
He wrapped her in his arms when she looked as though she was about to cry. “Jill, it’s okay. They won’t tell anyone, right?”